The number of programs and students in the Brazilian postgraduate system has doubled in the last 10 years. This has implications for the quality and financing of these programs as well as for the development of the regions where they are set. This study aims to investigate the reasons and limitations for the continued expansion of the Brazilian postgraduate system. Data (2011 to 2020) for this study came from: (i) the “Sucupira” postgraduate database from the Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES), (ii) Instituto Nacional de Estudos e Pesquisas Educacionais Anísio Teixeira (INEP), (iii) Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE), (iv) InCites ® and Web of Science data, and (v) questionnaire and meetings with the deans for Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) in Brazil. Data analyses included regression over time, frequency chi-square, and correspondence analyses. Different types of institutions in different regions showed varying opinions, with higher expectations for expansion in smaller, newer institutions, especially private ones. While the HEIs in the Northern region believe that the master’s degree is to correct undergraduate flaws, the HEIs in the South and Central regions and the community believe that the master’s degree should develop professional skills. In contrast, the larger HEIs with older postgraduate programs in all regions believe in direct doctorate strategy. The reasons for creating new post-graduate programs involved following the institution’s general guidelines for private and community HEIs and granting the lecturers’ wishes or constant expansion depending on region, North, Northeast, and Central regions, as well as for creating medium-sized state universities. State-of-the-art research or the interests of society were prevalent for the largest and oldest HEIs. Continued expansion of the Brazilian postgraduate system needs to take into account factors including the demand for the program, regionalization, the quality of the programs, the means of funding, and the student vacancies existing in programs with high grades, among other challenges.

The post-1988 period in Brazil has brought as a consequence a greater role for the Judiciary in the political game, a fact that can be derived either from institutional arrangements or from strategies undertaken by its agents. Focusing on the second approach, the article explores whether exists a communication strategy between the Brazilian Federal Supreme Court (STF) and the public. According to the literature, in spite of the fact that the Judiciary differs from other political actors because it does not rely on the electorate, it is similar in terms of the need to provide transparency in its decisions, in order to achieve institutional legitimacy. In the Brazilian case, there is a constant externalization of messages directed at symbols of justice, objectivity, and impartiality and, since mid-2000's, there has been an increase in the institution's transparency, with emphasis on the televised transmission of its plenary sessions and a detailed institutional web page containing news and complete content of rulings. Considering that, from a comparative perspective, the constitutional court has become extremely exposed, one wonders: is there institutional selectivity in relation to its decisions? In order to answer this question, press releases from the Federal Supreme Court and judicial decisions were examined, over a 16-year time frame, from 2000 to 2016. The research utilized mixed methods: textual data mining techniques and statistics. The findings suggest that there is an intention, consistent throughout the time period studied, to transmit an image of an activist court.

Resumo O pós-1988 trouxe maior protagonismo do Judiciário no jogo político, fato que pode derivar tanto de arranjos institucionais quanto de estratégias de seus agentes. Focando na segunda abordagem, discute-se se há uma estratégia de comunicação do Supremo Tribunal Federal (STF) com o público. De acordo com a literatura, embora o Judiciário se diferencie de outros atores políticos por não necessitar do eleitorado, assemelha-se quanto à necessidade de proporcionar transparência às suas decisões, de modo a alcançar legitimidade institucional. No caso brasileiro, há constantemente uma exteriorização de mensagens direcionadas a símbolos de justiça, objetividade e imparcialidade, e houve, desde meados dos anos 2000, um recrudescimento da visibilidade daquela instituição, destacando-se a transmissão televisionada de suas sessões plenárias e uma detalhada página institucional que contém notícias e inteiro teor de julgados. Considerando que, em perspectiva comparada, a corte constitucional tornou-se extremamente exposta, questiona-se: há seletividade institucional em relação às decisões promovidas? Para responder a essa pergunta, foram observados comunicados de imprensa do STF e decisões judiciais, em um recorte temporal de 2000 a 2016. A pesquisa utilizou métodos mistos: técnica de mineração de dados textuais e estatística. Os resultados encontrados sugerem que há uma intenção, constante ao longo da série temporal, de enfatizar a imagem de tribunal ativista.

A impunidade é geralmente percebida na Ciência Política como uma incapacidade ou mesmo oportuna falta de vontade dos membros do Estado em aplicar a lei. Pouco se observa, no entanto, a trajetória e o papel das instituições neste contexto. A escolha por leis mais brandas, por tratamento processual diferenciado a determinados agentes e um sistema recursal de decisões judiciais flexível, por exemplo, podem fomentar a impunidade de grupos sociais seletos. Desse modo, a trajetória de construção das regras do jogo importa. Este trabalho se propõe a duas análises: 1) historiar e discutir: i) a sistemática de execução de pena na história do direito brasileiro e ii) a adoção do foro por prerrogativa de função pelo sistema jurídico brasileiro; e 2) observar empiricamente a dinâmica de julgamento do Foro Privilegiado em dois Tribunais Superiores (Supremo Tribunal Federal e Superior Tribunal de Justiça) no período posterior à promulgação da Carta Magna de 1988. O intuito é lançar luz sobre como o desenho institucional brasileiro é capaz de relativizar instrumentos punitivos para as elites nacionais. Nossa conclusão aponta que esses institutos dificultam sobremaneira a possibilidade de punição de membros da elite política no Brasil, favorecendo a impunidade e provocando mutações na lógica do sistema punitivo estatal com repercussões no sistema político.

Impunity is generally perceived in Political Science as an inability or even opportune unwillingness of State members to apply the law. Little is observed, however, about the trajectory and role of institutions in this context. The choice for more lenient laws, for differentiated procedural treatment for certain agents and a flexible appeal system for judicial decisions, for example, can encourage impunity for selected social groups. In this way, the trajectory of construction of the rules of the game matters. This work proposes two analyses: 1) to describe and discuss: i) the systematic execution of sentences in the history of Brazilian law and ii) the adoption of the forum by prerogative of function by the Brazilian legal system; and 2) empirically observe the dynamics of the Privileged Forum judgment in two Superior Courts (Federal Supreme Court and Superior Court of Justice) in the period after the enactment of the Magna Carta of 1988. The aim is to shed light on how the Brazilian institutional design is capable of to relativize punitive instruments for national elites. Our conclusion points out that these institutes make it extremely difficult to punish members of the political elite in Brazil, favoring impunity and causing changes in the logic of the state punitive system with repercussions on the political system.

ObjectiveThis paper studies the integrity of the vote counting system in Brazil.MethodWe analyze data from the Superior Electoral Court (TSE) for the 2018 Brazilian presidential election to assess suspicious vote count patterns deploying five techniques commonly used to detect fraud: a) the second-digit Benford's law test; b) the last digit mean; c) frequency analysis of last digits 0 and 5; d) correlation between the percentage of votes and the turnout rate; and e) resampled Kernel density of the proportion of votes.ResultsThe results show that the second-digit distributions for the three most voted candidates – Jair Messias Bolsonaro (PSL), Fernando Haddad (PT), and Ciro Gomes (PDT) – conform to Benford's law. We also find that last digit means and last digit frequency are within normal parameters, indicating no irregularities. Similarly, the fingerprint plot indicates a correlation coefficient that is consistent with the theoretical expectation of a fair election. The resampled Kernel density suggests that the vote count was performed without statistically significant distortions. These results are robust at different levels of data aggregation (polling station and municipality).ConclusionThe joint application of digit-focused tests, regression-based techniques, and patterns in the distribution of vote-shares provide a more reliable method for detecting anomalous cases. Relying on this unified framework, we find no evidence of electoral fraud in the 2018 Brazilian presidential election. These results advance our current understanding of statistical forensics tools and may be easily replicated to examine electoral integrity in other countries.

The present study provided an overview of evaluation data from the “Sucupira Platform,” questionnaires with post-graduate deans, discussion forums, and international databases to assess the Brazilian post-graduate evaluation system. The system is highly standardised and homogenous throughout the country with little flexibility. There is a disconnect with ongoing changes in international graduate studies, especially regarding the possibility of adopting flexible and temporary doctoral projects in international partnerships. The evaluation focuses mainly on process, not results, impact, and social relevance. Although the current system requires strategic planning and self-assessment, these are not used when evaluating results. The system should be sensitive to differences, valuing the diversity of institutional projects. Changes in the evaluation require a clear timeline and careful definition of indicators. The improvement of information collection must occur in coordination with CNPq, and the new data collecting platform must be able to import information from various sources (RAIS, Lattes, WIPO, PrInt, etc.). According to their purposes, the separate indication in CAPES’ spreadsheets on the legal status of private and community/confessional institutions is fundamental for improved data analysis. The assignment of grades rather than scores (e.g., in implementation, consolidated nationally/internationally) is questioned.

Portuguese Abstract: Como se comporta o Supremo Tribunal Federal (STF), quando investido no papel de Corte de primeira instância, para o julgamento das acoes penais originarias”? As hipoteses de foro por prerrogativa de funcao, tambem conhecidas pela expressao “foro privilegiado”, embora presentes ocasionalmente em um conjunto de paises, sao um fenomeno associado a desenhos institucionais originarios de transicoes democraticas, notadamente as Constituicoes latino-americanas. No Brasil ganharam notoriedade a partir do julgamento da acao penal no 470, resultante do escândalo do “mensalao”, em que diversos atores do Executivo e do Legislativo foram condenados, em virtude de condutas ilicitas, anteriormente praticadas durante o exercicio de mandato eletivo e/ou de funcao publica nas mais altas esferas decisorias. Partindo das hipoteses de que a Corte Suprema e seletiva quanto aos processos que leva a julgamento e que muitas vezes opta por condutas autorrestritas, especialmente em situacoes que fogem ao exercicio estrito da revisao judicial, esta pesquisa dedica-se a compreensao empirica de tal fenomeno, atraves da analise de dados originais, codificados a partir de informacoes publicas disponiveis no sitio eletronico do Supremo Tribunal Federal, testando provaveis relacoes associativas entre a conduta dos julgadores e as caracteristicas das acoes penais originarias a eles submetidas. Como resultado, foi possivel observar a predominância de uma estrategia de autopreservacao utilizando para tanto padroes de seletividade, dentro dos quais ha variacao comportamental (decisoria) conforme variam alguns dos fatores. English Abstract: How does the Brazilian Supreme Court (STF) behave, when invested in the role of first instance court for the judgment of original criminal actions? The hypotheses of the jurisdiction for the prerogative of function, also known by the expression “privileged forum”, although occasionally present in a group of countries, are a phenomenon associated with institutional designs originating from democratic transitions, notably the Latin American Constitutions. In Brazil, they gained notoriety after the judgment of criminal action No. 470, resulting from the scandal of the “mensalao”, in which several actors of the Executive and Legislative were condemned, due to illicit conduct, previously practiced during the exercise of their elective mandate and/or civil service in the highest decision-making spheres. Based on the assumptions that the Supreme Court is selective in the processes it leads to trial and that it often opts for self-restricted conduct, especially in situations that escape the strict exercise of judicial review, this research is dedicated to the empirical understanding of this phenomenon, through the analysis of original data, encoded from public information available on the website of the STFt, testing probable associative relationships between the conduct of the judges and the characteristics of the criminal proceedings. As a result, it was possible to observe the predominance of a self-preservation strategy using selectivity patterns, within which there is behavioral (decision-making) variation as some factors vary.

Como se comporta o Supremo Tribunal Federal (STF), quando investido no papel de Corte de primeira instância, para o julgamento das ações penais originárias”? As hipóteses de foro por prerrogativa de função, também conhecidas pela expressão “foro privilegiado”, embora presentes ocasionalmente em um conjunto de países, são um fenômeno associado a desenhos institucionais originários de transições democráticas, notadamente às Constituições latino-americanas. No Brasil ganharam notoriedade a partir do julgamento da ação penal nº 470, resultante do escândalo do “mensalão”, em que diversos atores do Executivo e do Legislativo foram condenados, em virtude de condutas ilícitas, anteriormente praticadas durante o exercício de mandato eletivo e/ou de função pública nas mais altas esferas decisórias. Partindo das hipóteses de que a Corte Suprema é seletiva quanto aos processos que leva a julgamento e que muitas vezes opta por condutas autorrestritas, especialmente em situações que fogem ao exercício estrito da revisão judicial, esta pesquisa dedica-se à compreensão empírica de tal fenômeno, através da análise de dados originais, codificados a partir de informações públicas disponíveis no sítio eletrônico do Supremo Tribunal Federal, testando prováveis relações associativas entre a conduta dos julgadores e as características das ações penais originárias a eles submetidas. Como resultado, foi possível observar a predominância de uma estratégia de autopreservação utilizando para tanto padrões de seletividade, dentro dos quais há variação comportamental (decisória) conforme variam alguns dos fatores.

RESUMO Introducao: Este artigo analisa o processo de empoderamento do Supremo Tribunal Federal (STF) do Brasil entre 1945 e 2015.Oobjetivo e explicar o que tornou o STF tao poderoso institucionalmente e como isso ocorreu. Estudos sobre a expansao global do poder judicial apontam uma multiplicidade de causas para explicar esse fenomeno, mas pesquisas recentes vem indicando a fragmentacao politico-partidaria como a principal causa do empoderamento judicial. O presente trabalho testa a hipotese de que quanto maior a fragmentacao partidaria, mais poder institucional o STF possuira. Materiais e Metodos: Como variavel dependente, foi criado um indicador sintetico que mensura o poder institucional do Supremo Tribunal Federal ano a ano. As variaveis independentes mensuraram anualmente a composicao partidaria da Câmara dos Deputados para o mesmo periodo. Alem dessas variaveis, foram importadas outras medidas da base de dados do V-Dem. Para essa analise foram utilizados modelos lineares simples, lineares generalizados e multinomiais. Resultados: Foi identificado um alto impacto da fragmentacao partidaria no empoderamento institucional do STF. Em todos os testes, a fragmentacao partidaria aumentou as chances de empoderamento institucional do Poder Judiciario brasileiro. Discussao: As reformas exogenas que geraram esse empoderamento se deram com o apoio do Poder Executivo e com a leniencia do Poder Legislativo, transformando a Suprema Corte brasileira na Rainha do jogo de xadrez institucional nacional. PALAVRAS-CHAVE: Poder Judiciario; fragmentacao partidaria; empoderamento judicial; Supremo Tribunal Federal; multinomial; analise fatorial.

ABSTRACT Introduction: This article deals with the Supreme Federal Court’s empowerment trajectory, exploring exogenous variables in order to explain what made the Supreme Court so institutionally powerful, and how it happened. After the classic studies on the global expansion of the judicial power, that pointed to a myriad of causes as a result of the phenomenon, several recent researches have indicated the political-party fragmentation as the main cause of judicial empowerment. Seeking to corroborate these analyses, the present work analyzes the institutional empowerment of the Brazilian Judiciary from 1945 to 2015, testing the hypothesis the greater the party fragmentation, more institutional power the STF holds. Materials and Methods: As a dependent variable, a synthetic indicator was created to measure the institutional power of the Federal Supreme Court year by year. The independent variables measure the party composition of the Chamber of Deputies annually for the same period. In addition to these variables, other measures were imported from the V-Dem database. For this analysis, simple linear, generalized linear and multinomial models were used. Results: We identified significant impact of party fragmentation on institutional empowerment of the Supreme Court. In all tests, party fragmentation increased the chances of institutional empowerment of the Brazilian judiciary. Discussion: The exogenous reforms that generated this empowerment took place with the support of the Executive and the leniency of the Legislative, transforming the Brazilian Supreme Court into the Queen of the Chess.

Portuguese Abstract: Que incentivos podem influenciar uma Corte Suprema a interromper uma longa e estavel trajetoria decisional acerca de um tema? A literatura sobre processo decisorio e comportamento judicial em materia de conflitos federativos aponta para um padrao comportamental majoritario, no qual o STF tem, ao longo dos anos, sucessivamente afirmado e reforcado a predominância da Uniao nas questoes federativas, em detrimento dos interesses dos demais entes federativos (Estados, Distrito Federal e Municipios). Entretanto, ao julgar o conflito acerca dos limites federativos a competencia legislativa, especificamente quanto aos criterios de isolamento social inerentes as politicas publicas de enfrentamento a pandemia covid19, os ministros do Supremo Tribunal Federal aparentemente alteraram a trajetoria dos julgamentos de conflitos federativos. Como esta situacao de calamidade epidemiologica afetou as estrategias decisorias dos ministros de nossa Corte Suprema quanto a apreciacao de questoes federativas? Este artigo se dedica a analise qualitativa da referida decisao colegiada (MC-ADI 6341), atraves de um estudo de caso, com a finalidade de compreender como tais circunstâncias excepcionais de calamidade sanitaria influenciaram no processo decisorio do tribunal e na mudanca de trajetoria no modo de revisao judicial dos conflitos federativos. English Abstract: What incentives can influence a Supreme Court to interrupt a long and stable decision-making path on a topic? The literature on decision-making and judicial behavior in matters of federal conflicts points to a majority behavioral pattern, in which the Supreme Court has, over the years, successively affirmed and reinforced the predominance of the Union in federative issues, to the detriment of the interests of other entities. federative (States, Federal District, and Municipalities). However, when judging the conflict over the federal limits to legislative competence, specifically regarding the criteria of social isolation inherent in public policies to confront the pandemic COVID-19, the ministers of the Supreme Federal Court apparently changed the trajectory of the federal conflict judgments. How has this situation of epidemiological calamity affected the decision-making strategies of the ministers of our Supreme Court regarding the assessment of federal issues? This article is dedicated to the qualitative analysis of the referred collegiate decision (MC-ADI 6341), through a case study, with the purpose of understanding how such exceptional circumstances of sanitary calamity influenced the court’s decision-making process and the change of trajectory in the way judicial review of federal conflicts.

Que incentivos podem influenciar uma Corte Suprema a interromper uma longa e estavel trajetoria decisional acerca de um tema? A literatura sobre processo decisorio e comportamento judicial em materia de conflitos federativos aponta para um padrao comportamental majoritario, no qual o STF tem, ao longo dos anos, sucessivamente afirmado e reforcado a predominância da Uniao nas questoes federativas, em detrimento dos interesses dos demais entes federativos (Estados, Distrito Federal e Municipios). Entretanto, ao julgar o conflito acerca dos limites federativos a competencia legislativa, especificamente quanto aos criterios de isolamento social inerentes as politicas publicas de enfrentamento a pandemia covid19, os ministros do Supremo Tribunal Federal aparentemente alteraram a trajetoria dos julgamentos de conflitos federativos. Como esta situacao de calamidade epidemiologica afetou as estrategias decisorias dos ministros de nossa Corte Suprema quanto a apreciacao de questoes federativas? Este artigo se dedica a analise qualitativa da referida decisao colegiada (MC-ADI 6341), atraves de um estudo de caso, com a finalidade de compreender como tais circunstâncias excepcionais de calamidade sanitaria influenciaram no processo decisorio do tribunal e na mudanca de trajetoria no modo de revisao judicial dos conflitos federativos.

This paper seeks further evidence of the College member profile to assess whether the European Commissioners remain experts in their respective portfolios. Professional and political data for all former European Commissioners (N=287) was used. The paper concludes that there’s no significant evidence to affirm that European Commissioners have become less technocratic and more political actors.

After 24 years of constitutional rule in Brazil, what can be learned about the interaction between pressure groups and the Brazilian Federal Supreme Court (FSC)? Which are the political actors who achieve the best results? What issues are judged more by the FSC? Does the FSC favor a specific topic or decisions are made regarding the plaintiff over the subject matter? If it were the case, who and what are the privileged ones by its decisions? This article analyzes the interaction between civil society and the Judiciary, based on observation of the use of Direct Unconstitutional Action (DUAs). The paper also assesses the industrial lawsuits, filed in stf jurisdiction by the National Industry Union (CNI) and argues that: (1) the powerful groups received most success when proposing DUAs; (2) while there was a low probability of success, the groups gained benefits from bringing the conflict of interest to Supreme Court; and (3) the judicialization of pressure groups' interests is a complementary and coordinated strategy with groups advocacy in the legislative arena.

After 24 years of constitutional rule in Brazil, what can be learned about the interaction between pressure groups and the Brazilian Federal Supreme Court (fsc)? Which are the political actors who achieve the best results? What issues are judged more by the fsc? Does the fsc favor a specific topic or decisions are made regarding the plaintiff over the subject matter? If it were the case, who and what are the privileged ones by its decisions? This article analyzes the interaction between civil society and the Judiciary, based on observation of the use of Direct Unconstitutional Action (duas). The paper also assesses the industrial lawsuits, filed in stf jurisdiction by the National Industry Union (cni) and argues that: (1) the powerful groups received most success when proposing duas; (2) while there was a low probability of success, the groups gained benefits from bringing the conflict of interest to Supreme Court; and (3) the judicialization of pressure groups’ interests is a complementary and coordinated strategy with groups advocacy in the legislative arena.

Unlike what happens in the presidential elections in Brazil, where the PT and the PSDB alternate in competition for the presidency, subnational elections have shown a different dynamic over time, even different from that of national political. Therefore, this article tries to sketch out the scenario and dynamics of political parties at the subnational level in Brazil in the last elections of October 2014. To do so, an attempt is made to analyze the outcome of elections for governor of the States and the Federal District, in addition to observing the composition of state legislature seats, taking the framework of parties as the basis of the explanation.

Electoral Systems and Judicial Review in Developing Countries * (Yadav, Vineeta and Mukherjee, Bumba. Democracy, Electoral Systems, and Judicial Empowerment in Developing Countries. Michigan Press, 2014)The interest regarding the effects a strong Judiciary may have on political systems has a long history. Tocqueville in his seminal work Democracy in America had already warned us of such phenomenon centuries ago1. Very recently, political science as a discipline has dealt with the global phenomenon of the expansion of Judiciary Power. This process presents itself through various levels of social relations up until the political level. In the specific field of politics, we may see the growing inclusion of the Judiciary as an important, and often decisive, actor in decision-making processes2.The purpose of this book is to study the determinants in the constitutional empowerment (or lack thereof) of the judiciary in young democracies in developing countries, examining the conditions through which the judiciary was granted the important legal mechanism of judicial review. The book also attempts to analyze policies maintaining a de facto independence from the courts in newly established democracies in developing countries. The authors seek answers by analyzing the interaction between government, opposition, and the judiciary across different contexts of domestic institutions and political conditions. Subsequently, the authors empirically test their answers with statistical tests and, in the end, select sets and compare them in order to illustrate the underlying causal dynamics of adopting institutional judicial review (de jure) and judicial independence in practice (de facto) within the democracies of developing countries3.In the first chapter, the authors state the research questions. The book's initial question is: why did governments in some young democracies explicitly adopt judicial review in the early years of democratic transition while other countries did not? According to the authors, researchers have identified important factors for this distinction, such as political fragmentation, electoral uncertainty, and Human Rights protection as crucial determinants for adopting judicial review. However, they did not explain all the judicial review variations (de jure) observed in young developing democracies. However, these studies cannot focus solely on the institutional design (de jure) of judicial review. One must analyze the independence of the judiciary in practice (de facto). Some researchers associate de facto independence to the separation of powers and the higher levels of political competition, as they create a more uncertain environment for electoral results, leading political elites to develop strategies to deal with the challenges of domestic politics established by this environment. Other studies indicate that, for example, elites create strategies to safeguard themselves against future retaliations from the opposition. In the short term, elites react to uncertainty by creating a genuinely independent judiciary. In contrast, the long-term associated with low competitive politics establishes incentives for the elite to increase their own power by restricting judicial independence.These arguments do not stand against the authors' elaborate study. By using a risk rate (likelihood of government collapse) as a proxy for strategies over time (short and long term), the results showed that a high risk-rate (equivalent to short-term) of governments in power are associated with an increase of de facto judicial independence of 56% within the sample of developing countries. However, the remaining 44% contradict theoretical expectations and show that an increase in the risk rate is associated with a decrease in judicial independence. This conundrum leads to the book's second question: why do countries invest at different levels in judicial independence?The second chapter provides the theoretical framework seeking answer two questions: 1) During the early years of transitional governments, why did some democracies (but not others) deny or constitutionally restrict full judicial review? …

Unlike what happens in the presidential elections in Brazil, where the PT and the PSDB alternate in competition for the presidency, subnational elections have shown a different dynamic over time, even different from that of national political. Therefore, this article tries to sketch out the scenario and dynamics of political parties at the subnational level in Brazil in the last elections of October 2014. To do so, an attempt is made to analyze the outcome of elections for governor of the States and the Federal District, in addition to observing the composition of state legislature seats, taking the framework of parties as the basis of the explanation.