Governação democrática: papel da Assembleia da Republica na representação dos interesses da sociedade civil no período 1994-2001: os casos da proposta da revisão da Lei de terras e da proposta de revisão da Lei do trabalho

Abstract

The paper discusses the role of the Assembly of the Republic (AR) in representing the interests of civil society since 1994 - 2001, focusing on two case studies, namely: the Proposed Review of the Land Law and the Proposed Review of the Law on Land Work. The study reveals that, despite the exclusivity of the representative system and the excessive partisanship of the dynamics of the Legislative process, there are spaces in the RA for the representation of non-party interests that were captured from the analysis of the legislative process in the activities of the Commissions. The Legislative process (Law No. 6/2001), streamlined the work of the Commissions and the role of civil society in it. In the relationship with civil society, the functions of the Legislative Branch of the AR materialize more in the production of public policies due to a greater representation of the interests of civil society, in addition to the mere legitimation of the regime and the decisions that emanate from it. The permeability of the AR to the demands of non-partisan actors in the Legislative process is possible because the weak technical capacity of this, forces it to resort to experts from other non-Legislative arenas. But the study shows that this relationship between the RA and the experts is not linear, since there is nothing to guarantee that legislators will introduce substantive amendments to the final laws with inputs from contributions from hearings with civil society, incorporated in their specialized reports.