National Council of Justice and the one test: democratizing the Brazilian Judiciary

Abstract

This article evaluates the potential impacts of the reforms introduced by the National Council of Justice on the composition of the judiciary. By examining the proposal for a unified judicial exam, it explores how this reform could alter the composition of Brazil's judicial elites by addressing two major obstacles to judicial democratization: the decentralization of justice administration and the methods of judge recruitment. To assess the centralization sought by the CNJ in contrast to the decentralization advocated by the courts of justice, the article primarily draws on Luciano Athayde’s research on the judiciary as an archipelago. The second part of the article examines the two models used in Brazil for recruiting judges: public examinations and appointments. In discussing the public examination process, the article references the work of Daniela Passos. The debate over the exam is divided into two parts. The first part examines the content of the exam and the skills it prioritizes for the judiciary. It also proposes suggestions for the content of a unified exam. The second part analyzes the socioeconomic profile of judges recruited through public examinations. This is followed by an investigation into the appointment
system, also examining the socioeconomic profile of appointed judges, in order to assess the effectiveness of appointments as a tool for democratizing the judiciary.