Brazilian judges and the judicialization of corporatist interests

Abstract

This paper discusses the judicialization of the corporatist interests of Brazilian judges, as well as the amount of space their agenda has been able to garner in the Federal Supreme Court (STF) docket. We base our work on judicial review cases from the period spanning 1978 - 2014, concentrating on those petitioned by judges and their professional associations. Our aim is to identify the agenda of claims sent to the STF, analyzing the extent to which judges and their associations have used their own political power to i) guarantee and advance career interests and benefits; ii) ensure and expand their institutional power and iii) defend general interests (“the common good”). We also seek to identify patterns of STF response to judges’ demands, as compared to its response to claims made by other interest groups. The discussion falls within the arena of judicial behavior studies and draws from the field of the sociology of professions. Our major conclusion is that the Federal Supreme Court favored the deliberation of the judges’ career interests, thereby awarding greater priority to their claims, above those of any other organized interest group during the period we studied.