Abstract

Individuals' right of access to justice represents a cornerstone in protection of human rights. As such, it is provided for in national Constitutions and in many international Conventions on human rights. Otherwise, individuals' access to justice often doesn't seem to be recognized and really guaranteed in regional organizations due to the intergovernmental nature of most of them. However, recently some regional economic organizations in developing countries have been characterized by the so called «judicialization process» and, as a consequence, they have gradually conferred to individuals the right to resort directly to their new judicial bodies. So, this paper explores the right of access to regional justice recognized to legal and natural persons within such organizations. This analysis is going to be carried out in a comparative perspective in order to find out common features which enable to insert such regional judicial systems in specific legal categories.