Barroso ends cycle that distanced the Supreme Court from the working class.

The minister leaves the Supreme Court with the image of a defender of threatened democracy, but also with the weight of having led the liberal shift that weakened social protection for workers in Brazil. The country now needs to rediscover the 1988 Constitution and restore the social soul of the Judiciary.

Luís Roberto Barroso leaves the Supreme Federal Court with a biography marked by contrasts that largely reflect the contradictions of the country's own recent history. It is undeniable that he played a relevant role in defending democracy when it was at risk. He was a firm voice against authoritarianism, defended the integrity of electronic voting machines, and confronted Bolsonaro's supporters in their attacks on constitutional legality. In this respect, he rendered an important service to the Republic and will deserve historical recognition.

But this trajectory cannot be dissociated from the context in which the Supreme Federal Court (STF), as an institution, failed to protect social democracy when it began to be dismantled—even before the rise of neo-fascism. When the 2016 parliamentary coup removed President Dilma Rousseff without any crime of responsibility, the Supreme Court opted for complicit silence, legitimizing, through omission, the democratic rupture that opened the doors to a series of setbacks. The removal of an elected president, based on political rather than legal interpretations, represented a profound blow to the rule of law. It was the moment when the STF ceased to be the guardian of the Constitution and became a complacent arbiter of an exceptional process disguised as legality.

The same court that, years later, would firmly confront Bolsonaro's regime was the one that, before him, passively witnessed the dismantling of popular sovereignty and the rise of an illegitimate government—that of Michel Temer—which took it upon itself to implement the neoliberal agenda that the popular vote had rejected.

The liberal turn and the break with the Citizen Constitution

It was under Temer that Congress approved, in a rushed manner, the 2017 Labor Reform (Law 13.467) — one of the most profound and regressive in history. This law would not have survived without the political and legal support of the Supreme Court, which endorsed, point by point, the changes imposed on the world of work.

Barroso was one of the main architects of this liberal shift within the Court. In the judgment of ADPF 324, which he authored, and in RE 958.252 (Topic 725), the Supreme Court legitimized unrestricted outsourcing, including in core activities, breaking with decades of protective jurisprudence. The direct link between employer and employee, which the CLT (Consolidation of Labor Laws) treated as the core of social stability, was dissolved into a web of business intermediaries.

In 2018, under the same liberal impulse, the Supreme Court validated the end of mandatory union dues (ADI 5794 and related cases), a measure presented as individual liberation, but which in practice financially strangled unions and reduced the collective strength of the working class. What was sold as "autonomy" was, in reality, the imposition of isolation that weakened grassroots organizations and undermined resistance to reforms.

Subsequently, the Court consolidated the principle of negotiated agreements over legislation (Topic 1046), legitimizing agreements that restrict rights established by law under the justification of "preserving jobs." From then on, intermittent contracts, the use of independent contractors, and precarious forms of employment multiplied—direct products of the alliance between the Temer government, a conservative Congress, and a complicit Supreme Court.

The parliamentary coup of 2016, the Labor Reform of 2017, and the Pension Reform of 2019, already under Jair Bolsonaro and Paulo Guedes, form a single historical cycle: the cycle of the neoliberal dismantling of social protection. At each stage, the Supreme Federal Court (STF) acted not as a counterweight, but as a legal guarantor of the regression.

The human cost of modernization.

The effects of this shift are visible everywhere. According to IBGE (Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics), the country has 38,8 million informal workers and 16,1 million underemployed people—numbers that overlap but reveal the magnitude of precarious employment. Almost half of the employed population lives without basic labor guarantees, without vacations, 13th-month salary, paid leave, or social security contributions.

The rhetoric of "contractual freedom" and "economic efficiency" served to mask the old project of income concentration. Under the guise of modernization, an era of legalized insecurity was established. Labor became a cheap commodity, and human dignity came to depend on luck or subordination.

The same judge who defended political democracy blessed economic de-democratization. The Supreme Court that reacted to insane and deranged authoritarianism was the same one that legitimized the authoritarianism of finance capital. The "modernization" touted by Barroso and his peers did not liberate anyone—it only transferred the cost of the crisis to the shoulders of the worker.

The paradox of the liberal and progressive minister.

Barroso ends his tenure at the Supreme Court as a symbol of a contradiction of the times. He was the minister who confronted the coup plotters and defended institutional order, but also the jurist who helped dismantle the social foundations of the Constitution. He represented the progressive liberal who believes in civil rights but distrusts state intervention and collective organization.

His trajectory expresses the dilemma of a legal elite that combats political authoritarianism but accepts the authoritarianism of the market. Over the past few years, the Supreme Court—under his influence—has distanced itself from the people and moved closer to economic corporations, reinterpreting labor law as a mere contractual instrument. This ideological inversion has produced a technocratic justice system that speaks of efficiency while the country deindustrializes and workers lose their footing.

Barroso was undoubtedly a statesman. But he was also the minister who helped transform the Court into an institution that validated Brazilian neoliberalism. He leaves with the respect of formal democrats, but with the weight of having weakened substantive democracy—the kind measured by jobs, wages, and the dignity of those who work.

The historic task of reconnecting with the 1988 Constitution.

The vacancy created by his retirement is not merely administrative: it represents a historical crossroads. Brazil needs to decide whether to continue down the path of legal liberalism or return to the course of social constitutionalism inaugurated in 1988.

The Citizen Constitution remains alive, and within it are enshrined the social value of work, the role of the State as a planner of development, and the duty to reduce inequalities. A Democratic State of Law is only legitimate if it is also a Social State of Law. Defending the Constitution means defending the people who placed their hope in it—and this requires reversing the dismantling that began in 2016 and was consolidated in the reforms of Temer and Bolsonaro.

The new minister who will occupy this seat must represent the Supreme Court's reunion with the real Brazil: the Brazil that works, produces, and sustains the country without a voice or representation in the courts. They need to understand that the law is not neutral—it has a side, and that side is that of human dignity and social justice. The Supreme Court must once again listen to the factory floor, the classroom, the counter, and the driver. Only then will it recover the public purpose of its existence.