Normative hierarchies in Brazilian law

• Grant number: 21/15171-1
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Post-Doctoral
• Start date: August 01, 2022
• End date: July 31, 2026
• Field of knowledge: Applied Social Sciences - Law - Public Law
• Principal Investigator: José Levi Mello do Amaral Júnior
• Grantee: Matheus Pelegrino da Silva
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Direito (FD). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• Associated scholarship(s): 23/08245-4 - Normative hierarchies in Brazilian law, BE.EP.PD

Abstract

Legal norms can be distinguished not only in virtue of their contents, but also because of their hierarchical status in the legal order. The identification of the hierarchical status of the different kinds of norms consists in an approach through which it is possible to establish the limits of law creation, solve normative conflicts and finally promote the implementation of the goals of rule of law, predictability, democratic legitimacy of the state representative's acts and legal certainty. It is by taking into consideration particularly this last goal that the proposed project intends to investigate the matter of the normative hierarchies in Brazilian law.The main goals of the project are to identify the different normative hierarchies present in the Brazilian legal order, highlight their properties and analyze in a critical way the contributions of the legal literature and case law about this subject. Three major tasks will be performed in order to accomplish these main goals. Initially a general theory of the normative hierarchisations (of the legal staircase-like construction) will be presented, a theory that will clarify the main notions regarding the hierarchical organization of the norms and indicate the grounds for this organization. In a second stage this general theory will be applied in the analysis and classification of the normative kinds that are present in the Brazilian legal order. In this context the kinds of hierarchical relations that these normative kinds establish with each other will be indicated. In the third stage some special normative orders (the exceptions to the general hierarchisation of the legal norms) that exist in the Brazilian legal order will be identified and analyzed in light of the theory of the staircase-like constructions. (AU)