Federalismo assimétrico-municipalista para autonomização de povos e comunidades tradicionais no Brasil

Abstract

Federalism in Brazil, after being reshaped by its winding constitutional trajectory, emerged at the end of the 20th century with a democratic profile aimed at rebalancing, with the intention of harmonizing the pact between its four components, reducing socio-regional disparities and enabling popular participation in public process. Through effective decentralization, municipalities were elevated to the status of fully autonomous federated entities and given direct constitutional powers. And in order to reverse the political-legal project that had excluded non-hegemonic social groups, engendered by the six previous Constitutions, unprecedented social and collective prerogatives were inserted into the 1988 Constitution, where there is even a small chapter dedicated exclusively to indigenous peoples. However, the implementation of emancipatory policies has been hindered by Brazil's federal crisis, which is still ongoing, largely due to the centralizing dogma of power, the complex conflicts of competences between federal entities, the accentuated inequalities and the lack of an asymmetrical state stance to correct them, greatly affecting the political and

territorial autonomy of traditional peoples and communities. In this context, a neo- municipalism is suggested, based on making the autonomy of the entity closest to

the community effective and sharing it with the traditional populations within them, in order to democratize the federative ideology. These groups, historically weakened and deliberately made invisible, need protection in order to survive and enjoy their inalienable rights, guaranteeing them effective participation in public decision-making processes regarding their fundamental demands. The international standards protecting native peoples and the treatment given to their rights in other constitutionalisms will be analyzed for comparison and influence on Brazilian law. After demonstrating the Brazilian federal crisis and some proposals for dealing with it, we will look at the challenges facing the traditional communities that survive in the only two extractive reserves located on the coast of the state of Ceará (Batoque and Prainha do Canto Verde), which suffer from the inefficiency of the federalism practiced in Brazil. Finally, it will be shown that a model of an asymmetric-municipalist nature, enhanced by solid decentralization, with instruments of popular autonomy such as committees, consultation and prior, free and informed consent, would foster the citizenship needed to guarantee self-determination and repair the historical deficit that has been imposed on traditional Brazilian populations, especially those who survive on extractivism and whose land - and respective territory - are vital resources for achieving their needs and interests, based on shared autonomy with the municipalities, as a collective right extracted from the Constitution.