A revision of the author's thesis, Göttingen. / Bibliography: p. [303]-318.

A revision of the author's thesis, Göttingen. / Bibliography: p. [303]-318.

O presente estudo procura examinar criticamente a forma como as competências legislativas são interpretadas no Brasil. Em especial, pretende-se demonstrar que o tema pode e deve se beneficiar das modernas técnicas e instrumentos desenvolvidos pela dogmática do Direito Constitucional contemporâneo. O trabalho se estrutura em três partes. Na Primeira Parte, serão expostas algumas premissas teóricas sobre a interpretação constitucional, o federalismo e a sindicabilidade judicial das competências, que nortearão o desenvolvimento do estudo. Na Segunda Parte, examinam-se os processos de qualificação das leis e de interpretação das competências legislativas. A partir do esboço de uma teoria das competências legislativas, será defendida a aplicação de parâmetros segundo os quais, em princípio, todos os dispositivos de competência devem ser interpretados da forma mais ampliativa possível, sendo as eventuais restrições, impostas por outras regras de competência, consideradas e justificadas argumentativamente. Em sua Terceira Parte, e última, o estudo identificará o fenômeno dos conflitos de competências legislativas em geral, esquecidos pela doutrina brasileira , examinando, na sequência, alguns critérios para sua solução. Afastada a possibilidade de recurso à supremacia do direito federal e ao princípio da subsidiariedade, bem como a preferências de mérito, serão desenvolvidos dois parâmetros formais e um material para a solução das inconsistências insolúveis entre competências. / This paper aims to analyze critically the way heads of legislative power are read and enforced in Brazil. In particular, it tries to demonstrate that this subject can and should benefit from the modern techniques and instruments developed by contemporary Constitutional Law. The paper is divided in three parts. In the First Part, some theoretical premises are established, regarding constitutional interpretation, federalism, and the justiciability of federative conflicts, which shall guide the rest of the study. The Second Part examines the processes of characterization of laws and interpretation of heads of legislative power. After sketching a theory of legislative powers, the paper develops standards according to which, in principle, all heads of power ought to be read in their widest possible range, and restrictions imposed by heads of powers relating to other governments must be considered and justified argumentatively. In the Third Part, its last, the paper identifies the phenomenon of legal inconsistencies between heads of power usually forgotten by Brazilian authors and analyses some of the criteria proposed for their solution. Once the supremacy of federal law and the principle of subsidiarity, as well as content-based preferences are ruled out, the paper develops two form-based and one matter-based standard for the solution of the so-called real legal inconsistencies between heads of legislative power.

Thesis (doctoral)--Göttingen Universitat, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references.

O presente estudo procura examinar criticamente a forma como as competências legislativas são interpretadas no Brasil. Em especial, pretende-se demonstrar que o tema pode e deve se beneficiar das modernas técnicas e instrumentos desenvolvidos pela dogmática do Direito Constitucional contemporâneo. O trabalho se estrutura em três partes. Na Primeira Parte, serão expostas algumas premissas teóricas sobre a interpretação constitucional, o federalismo e a sindicabilidade judicial das competências, que nortearão o desenvolvimento do estudo. Na Segunda Parte, examinam-se os processos de qualificação das leis e de interpretação das competências legislativas. A partir do esboço de uma teoria das competências legislativas, será defendida a aplicação de parâmetros segundo os quais, em princípio, todos os dispositivos de competência devem ser interpretados da forma mais ampliativa possível, sendo as eventuais restrições, impostas por outras regras de competência, consideradas e justificadas argumentativamente. Em sua Terceira Parte, e última, o estudo identificará o fenômeno dos conflitos de competências legislativas em geral, esquecidos pela doutrina brasileira , examinando, na sequência, alguns critérios para sua solução. Afastada a possibilidade de recurso à supremacia do direito federal e ao princípio da subsidiariedade, bem como a preferências de mérito, serão desenvolvidos dois parâmetros formais e um material para a solução das inconsistências insolúveis entre competências. / This paper aims to analyze critically the way heads of legislative power are read and enforced in Brazil. In particular, it tries to demonstrate that this subject can and should benefit from the modern techniques and instruments developed by contemporary Constitutional Law. The paper is divided in three parts. In the First Part, some theoretical premises are established, regarding constitutional interpretation, federalism, and the justiciability of federative conflicts, which shall guide the rest of the study. The Second Part examines the processes of characterization of laws and interpretation of heads of legislative power. After sketching a theory of legislative powers, the paper develops standards according to which, in principle, all heads of power ought to be read in their widest possible range, and restrictions imposed by heads of powers relating to other governments must be considered and justified argumentatively. In the Third Part, its last, the paper identifies the phenomenon of legal inconsistencies between heads of power usually forgotten by Brazilian authors and analyses some of the criteria proposed for their solution. Once the supremacy of federal law and the principle of subsidiarity, as well as content-based preferences are ruled out, the paper develops two form-based and one matter-based standard for the solution of the so-called real legal inconsistencies between heads of legislative power.

No Estado federal, o poder decorrente da soberania, na promulgação da Constituição, distribui competências entre os entes da federação, os quais passam a deter autonomia legislativa para as matérias de sua competência, exercidas pelos seus governos próprios. Essa autonomia tem como pressuposto a existência de fontes de recursos independentes, bem como a possibilidade de escolher livremente a aplicação de seus gastos, prerrogativas que integram o conceito de autonomia financeira. A interpretação das limitações impostas ao poder reformador pelo artigo 60, § 4o, inciso I, da Constituição de 1988 divide a doutrina jurídica ao proceder à análise da alteração de competências tributárias legislativas dos Estados-membros, especialmente no tocante à constitucionalidade da modificação que limitaria a autonomia financeira desses entes e, em razão disso, tenderiam a abolir a forma federativa de Estado. Sob os pressupostos da teoria do positivismo jurídico metódico-axiológico, selecionada como guia para o presente trabalho, foi construída a fundamentação jurídica do princípio federativo na Constituição brasileira, para, então, desenvolver a análise de cinco hipóteses de alteração de competências tributárias dos Estados. As conclusões obtidas foram que (i) a exclusão integral das competências tributárias legislativas dos Estados constituiria uma violação da autonomia financeira destes, sendo vedada sua validade no ordenamento atual; (ii) a exclusão da competência legislativa para apenas um dos impostos seria vedada, salvo situações excepcionais concernentes a competências funcionalmente secundárias; (iii) a constitucionalidade da redução do critério material de incidência de um imposto de competência legislativa dos Estados deve ser verificada de acordo com a eficácia da supressão em face dos objetivos firmados, bem como diante da disponibilidade de meios alternativos de obter tais desígnios; (iv) a exclusão ou mitigação da competência tributária legislativa para fixar alíquotas dos tributos privativos é vedada, sendo permitida a existência de patamares mínimos e máximos para essas alíquotas; (v) a exclusão da competência legislativa para conceder benefícios fiscais é vedada, sendo permitido que essa matéria seja objeto de restrições relativas à necessidade de deliberação coletiva pelos Estados. / In the Federation, the power from the sovereignty, in the enactment of the Federal Constitution, allocates the levels of authorities amongst the federative members, which have legislative independence to the matters under their responsibility, exercised by their own government. Such independence is based on the assumption that independent resources are available, as well as that the costs can be freely incurred, comprising the definition of financial autonomy. The interpretation of the limitations established in article 60, paragraph 4, I, of the Federal Constitution of 1988, divides the legal science with respect to the legislative tax powers of the Member States, specifically with respect to the constitutionality of amendments that would limit their financial independence and, accordingly, would discontinue the federative view. Based on the methodic and axiological legal positivism, on which this work is developed, the legal justification of the federative principle of the Brazilian Constitution was proposed with a view to develop the analysis on the five alternatives related to the tax responsibilities of the States. The conclusions reached were that (i) the full exclusion of the legislative tax powers of the States would represent a violation against their financial autonomy, not allowed under current constitution; (ii) the exclusion of the legislative powers with respect to one of the taxes would not be permitted, except for extraordinary events of secondary relevance; (iii) the constitutionality of the reduction of the tax bases under the legislative powers of the States must be verified in accordance with the respective effectiveness of such tax based on the purposes agreed, as well as according to the availability of alternative means for such; (iv) the exclusion or mitigation of the tax powers to define the rates of the exclusive taxes is not permitted, but the minimum and maximum levels thereof are allowed; (v) the exclusion of the legislative powers to grant the tax benefits is not permitted; and such matter could be subject to the restrictions related to the need of collective approval by the States.

Magister Legum - LLM (Public Law and Jurisprudence) / In any democratic society, elections are a significant mechanism for citizens to communicate with their representatives. As a result, elections provide a window of opportunity to every voter to hire or fire any political party or independent representative. As an aggregated measure of popular preference, elections constitute an important means to affirm that people in any society should be free to choose their own government based on the parties political beliefs and policies that appeal to the needs of the electorates. Powell sums up this perspective in two points; first, the voter must be able to identify the prospective future governors and have some idea of what they will do if elected. Secondly, the outcome of the elections should bring into office a coherent government whose inherent powers are clearly defined and limited. However, elections sometimes do not produce a single party with an absolute majority to form a government. In such an instance, a coalition or minority government becomes inevitable. It has been argued that coalitions are formed for two different yet interrelated reasons; first to pursue common goals among coalition partners. Secondly, to enable the coalition partners to share the benefits related with being in power. No matter what the intentions are for forming a coalition by the political parties, coalition governments are bound to encounter challenges. One of the challenges is the need to consult and reach consensus among coalition partners, which may not only result in government decision-making being slower but also more complex. Secondly, conflicts within a ruling coalition can make a government unstable and weak due to conflicting ideologies.

No Estado federal, o poder decorrente da soberania, na promulgação da Constituição, distribui competências entre os entes da federação, os quais passam a deter autonomia legislativa para as matérias de sua competência, exercidas pelos seus governos próprios. Essa autonomia tem como pressuposto a existência de fontes de recursos independentes, bem como a possibilidade de escolher livremente a aplicação de seus gastos, prerrogativas que integram o conceito de autonomia financeira. A interpretação das limitações impostas ao poder reformador pelo artigo 60, § 4o, inciso I, da Constituição de 1988 divide a doutrina jurídica ao proceder à análise da alteração de competências tributárias legislativas dos Estados-membros, especialmente no tocante à constitucionalidade da modificação que limitaria a autonomia financeira desses entes e, em razão disso, tenderiam a abolir a forma federativa de Estado. Sob os pressupostos da teoria do positivismo jurídico metódico-axiológico, selecionada como guia para o presente trabalho, foi construída a fundamentação jurídica do princípio federativo na Constituição brasileira, para, então, desenvolver a análise de cinco hipóteses de alteração de competências tributárias dos Estados. As conclusões obtidas foram que (i) a exclusão integral das competências tributárias legislativas dos Estados constituiria uma violação da autonomia financeira destes, sendo vedada sua validade no ordenamento atual; (ii) a exclusão da competência legislativa para apenas um dos impostos seria vedada, salvo situações excepcionais concernentes a competências funcionalmente secundárias; (iii) a constitucionalidade da redução do critério material de incidência de um imposto de competência legislativa dos Estados deve ser verificada de acordo com a eficácia da supressão em face dos objetivos firmados, bem como diante da disponibilidade de meios alternativos de obter tais desígnios; (iv) a exclusão ou mitigação da competência tributária legislativa para fixar alíquotas dos tributos privativos é vedada, sendo permitida a existência de patamares mínimos e máximos para essas alíquotas; (v) a exclusão da competência legislativa para conceder benefícios fiscais é vedada, sendo permitido que essa matéria seja objeto de restrições relativas à necessidade de deliberação coletiva pelos Estados. / In the Federation, the power from the sovereignty, in the enactment of the Federal Constitution, allocates the levels of authorities amongst the federative members, which have legislative independence to the matters under their responsibility, exercised by their own government. Such independence is based on the assumption that independent resources are available, as well as that the costs can be freely incurred, comprising the definition of financial autonomy. The interpretation of the limitations established in article 60, paragraph 4, I, of the Federal Constitution of 1988, divides the legal science with respect to the legislative tax powers of the Member States, specifically with respect to the constitutionality of amendments that would limit their financial independence and, accordingly, would discontinue the federative view. Based on the methodic and axiological legal positivism, on which this work is developed, the legal justification of the federative principle of the Brazilian Constitution was proposed with a view to develop the analysis on the five alternatives related to the tax responsibilities of the States. The conclusions reached were that (i) the full exclusion of the legislative tax powers of the States would represent a violation against their financial autonomy, not allowed under current constitution; (ii) the exclusion of the legislative powers with respect to one of the taxes would not be permitted, except for extraordinary events of secondary relevance; (iii) the constitutionality of the reduction of the tax bases under the legislative powers of the States must be verified in accordance with the respective effectiveness of such tax based on the purposes agreed, as well as according to the availability of alternative means for such; (iv) the exclusion or mitigation of the tax powers to define the rates of the exclusive taxes is not permitted, but the minimum and maximum levels thereof are allowed; (v) the exclusion of the legislative powers to grant the tax benefits is not permitted; and such matter could be subject to the restrictions related to the need of collective approval by the States.

An overview is given of the difficulties surrounding the concurrent jurisdiction of the Labour Court and High Court The main categories of the jurisdictional dispute are identified and systemised. The main branches are those of statutory overlap and interpretation of statutes. Statutory overlap concerns matters remaining from the industrial court era, urgent applications, delict and law of contract. Statutory interpretation mainly involves the interpretation of provisions in the Bill of Rights of the Constitution. An overview of the principles of jurisdiction with respect to the different courts, as well as a brief historical review of the development of such jurisdiction is given. Particular attention is given to the role of fundamental rights in the Constitution. Broad principles are identified whereby the difficulties may be addressed.

Le Parlement européen (PE) n’a occupé en 1957 qu’une place secondaire, ce qui entraînait une grande déception auprès des parlementaires, mettant en cause ses pouvoirs consultatifs qui ne portait qu’un sens symbolique. En valorisant la démocratie et la séparation des pouvoirs, le PE pourrait sortir de l’impasse à travers l’exploitation maximale de la procédure consultative. Jusqu’à l’Acte unique européen, le champ d’application de la consultation ne cesse de s’élargir. Idem pour l’augmentation des revendications du respect de son droit d’information et de consultation envers le Conseil. Le manque de moyens juridiques de contraindre le Conseil à accepter les avis du PE, qui se voient systématiquement refusés, nécessite le changement de position parlementaire dans les années 70 dans les relations entre les deux institutions. Les nouvelles procédures à effets juridiques, telles que la reconsultation, le droit d’approbation sur les accords internationaux et la codécision, ont été revendiquées, pourtant de manière irrégulière. Les mesures pour le renforcement des pouvoirs budgétaires se voient s’adopter, de sorte qu’elles favorisent non seulement le contrôle parlementaire en la matière, mais aussi le renforcement des pouvoirs dans les questions non-budgétaires : les pouvoirs législatifs. Le droit d’information et le pouvoir de consultation sur les activités budgétaires, ainsi que le contrôle effectif sur les budgets et leurs dépenses, font eux aussi l’objet de revendications parlementaires. Le Conseil européen et la Cour des comptes étaient également invoquées comme destinataires de ces revendications afin de persuader le Conseil et la Commission. Cette présente analyse démontre que le PE, tel qu’il est aujourd’hui, est un résultat de la collaboration dans les premières décennies avec les autres institutions et les grandes figures des États membres, lesquels jouent un rôle important pour orienter la discussion dans les Communautés. / The nature of the secondary place reserved for the European Parliament (EP) in 1957 brought about a big disappointment of the European representatives and critics of its consultative powers only of, then, symbolic significance. Putting emphasis on the principles of democracy and separation of powers, the EP attempted to come out of impasse by using at maximum the consultative procedures. Until the Single European Act, the demands of the EP on respect for information and consultation obligation by the Council continue to increase. Also was asserted an extended application of consultative procedure to the issues, for which the EP had not been obligatorily consulted by the Council. Lack of legal means to make the Council accept the opinions and demands of the EP, which had scarcely been adopted by the Council, can explain the position change of the EP during the 70s vis-à-vis the Council and the Commission. The new procedures with legal effects, such as re-consultation, the power of approbation regarding of international agreements and co-decision, have been insisted, but not consistently.Reinforcement of the EP’s budgetary powers aimed not only at enhancement of parliamentary control in the budgetary activities of the European Communities, but also at reinforcement of non-budgetary powers: legislative powers. The parliamentary demands for the respect by the Council of information and consultation obligations and for effective control over budgets and expenditures were part of the EP’s struggles to be justly recognized in the map of European political institutions. When the European Council and the Court of Auditors were also addressed the sort of demands, the EP aimed to persuade thereby the Council and the Commission.This present analysis shows that the EP, as is today, is a result of the collaboration with other institutions and important figures of the Member States, which played an important role to guide the discussion in the Communities.