Democratizar a jurisdição constitucional? O caso das audiências públicas no Supremo Tribunal Federal

Abstract

This article is part of a set of analyzes about judicialization of politics in Brazil, considering the performance of the Supreme Court (STF) in the exercise of judicial review. The object of analysis are the public hearings held by the Supreme Court from 2007 to 2014. The aim is to verify to what extent the public hearings have been becoming a mechanism able to extend deliberative character of the Court and foster dialogue and interface between state actors societal ones, and, thus, widening the informational basis and the legitimacy of its decisions. All public hearings, excluding those for which the data were not available were analyzed. The study involved analysis in comparative perspective (longitudinal and transversal) mobilizing documental analysis from an analytical framework built around the dimensions of interest. A detailed characterization of public hearings was held - rules, issues, actors, frames and dynamic interaction. In addition, we seek to identify the common elements to the events, their singularities, changes over time, advances and limits regarding the use that the Court has been carrying the instrument. The article breaks new ground by exploring the theoretical possibilities associated with the analysis of the relationship between constitutionalism and democracy, starting from the dichotomous tradition that was established from the beginning of constitutional democracies even more recent dialogical perspectives. Considering the peculiarities surrounding the Supreme Court's role in recent years, it emphasizes the urgency of this debate for Brazil and proposes to review the operation of an institutional mechanism of relatively recent introduction. As far as are known by the authors there is no work that has been proposed to such a detailed analysis of Brazilian Supreme Court's public hearings.