Mutação constitucional

Abstract

This essay intends to place the theme of constitutional change in the context of judicial system dynamics and to show the interdependence between Constitution normative strength and constitutional change, approaching the existing terminological divergencies, the dialetic relation between formal and informal constitutional change and the limits of the last one. It is also intended to warn about the need to take into consideration matters of institutional capacity and dynamic effects in the context of a living Constitution, in which the change derives from the participation of all the Powers and from the society as well. Concerning the Judicial Power, with support on democratic constitutionalism and constitutional implications of backlash (contrary social reaction to judicial decisions), it is demonstrated that constitutional change through judicial means may promote Constitution democratic legitimacy. It is likewise rescued the roles that the Executive and Legislative Powers may play in the course of constitutional changes, specially through the approval and nomination of the Federal Supreme Court Ministers and via constitutional amendments, laws and other legislative acts, so that the changes arise from an ongoing constitutional dialogue. To test the application of these theories into Brazilian law, it is drawn a landscape of several constitutional informal changes in Brazil and examined, in detail, two cases: in the first one, by denying the change of the norm that allows the Senate to cease the execution of a law declared inconstitutional by the Supreme Court and, in the second, by recognizing, according to historical and sociological analysis, the informal change of the principle of equality which is in the bottom of the debates over the racial affirmative actions.