Dictadura, Democracia y Justicia Transicional en Brasil: Trayectoria y Legados del Supremo Tribunal Federal

Abstract

The main goal of this article is to contribute to the current debate on transitional justice, observing the participation of the Brazilian Supreme Court (Supremo Tribunal Federal) in this process. To this end, the trajectories and institutional transformations of the Supreme Court during the last period of civil-military rule initiated in 1964 are analyzed. In particular, the article investigates themeans and goals of institutional changes, the political context and points out the continuation and legacies of the High Court in democracy, paying special attention to the violation of human rights carried out by state actors during the authoritarian regime. It concludes with a comparative analysis of the type of institutional transformation which occurred both during the authoritarian period as well as in democratic times.