Política nacional de participação social e estado democrático de direito: análise do decreto presidencial n. 8.243/2014 à luz da constituição federal de 1988

Abstract

The Decree no. 8.243/2014, which established the National Policy of Social Participation, as well as the System that corresponds to that policy, situated on the national constitutional order, valid since 1988 given the promulgation of the “Constituição Cidadã”, is the subject of the present research. Some people believe that the Decree would work as a tool with the objective of promoting the expansion of the Brazilian participative democracy in it’s most direct way, benefiting the holder of the Constituent Power: the people. To some others, it would be labeled as “Bolivarianism” and “Bolshevism”, and would implement a true political, or even electoral, maneuver from the President Dilma Rousseff, with the goal of including the social groups more directly in the debate about the execution of the public policies designed by the Federal Executive Power. It is important to underline that those who criticize the so said Decree say that the Worker’s Party, which the President is affiliated to, would exercise some influence over the social groups and other sectors of the civil society that are not institutionalized within the debate of public policies. The Decree, promulgated without the previous knowledge of the National Congress, would have interfered in the harmony and balance of the Republic’s Powers. What is certain is that the referred normative act of presidential initiative has been the subject of many discussions since it was approved, even because it is recognizably incipient if compared to other progresses that might have been reached on this subject. We come to the conclusion that the mere opposition of opinions of both parties explained above is not legally binding, since it does not have the purpose of resolving the problems about social participation in a satisfactory degree. We suggest that the policies implemented by the Decree are intensified thru, but not only, previous communication to the population about the terms of the extension of the social participation; the stimulus of other means of implementing the popular sovereignty in the national Democratic State submitted to the rule of law; the stimulus of public hearings and participation of the “amicus curiae”; the reduction of the actual potential constitutional obstructions to the accomplishment of full use of the tools of direct democracy (such as plebiscite, referendum and popular initiative); the raising of the political awareness of the people so that the citizens fulfill their rights of vote in a more thoughtful way, providing better choices and control over their representatives, so that the people will be more legitimated.