The forgotten agenda of Brazilian federalism: asymmetry, heterogeneity and diversity of Prosecution Service

Abstract

This paper examines the forgotten agenda of the justice system studies in Brazil: the association between federalism and the Public Prosecution Service (MP). The public administration and political science studies still provide a homogeneous overview of MP, neither considering the political and organizational asymmetry between the federal and state institutions, nor the heterogeneities and diversities existing in the Brazilian state structures. While the analyzes of the Executive and Legislative branches included the federative dimension as a key variable, the justice system studies do not consider federalism in their investigations, especially in the MP studies. Beyond pointing this conceptual fragility, the main contribution of this work is the creation of a theoretical framework to be tested in future empirical research about the MP, composed of the following elements: relationship with the local elite, the construction of the corporation's professionality in each local reality and the predominant options for controlling Public Administration and public policies at the subnational level throughout the Federation.