The Judicialization of the Municipal Electoral Competition in Brazil: A Study on Supplementary Elections from 2004 to 2018

Abstract

This study has the main objective of verifying the presupposition of Marchetti (2013) that the recent electoral competition that is marked by the judicialization also applies to the scope of the supplementary elections. The main hypothesis of the work is that the judicialization of municipal electoral competition has become an additional strategy used by political actors because of its effectiveness. The results indicate that approximately 58% of the Supplementary Elections that occurred in the period were motivated solely by lawsuits filed by opposition political groups. In these cases, the opposition can elect the new mayors in 62% of situations.