Seigneurial Hermeneutics and Judicial Truth: The Impact of Race on the Decision-Making Standards of the Brazilian Judiciary

This paper analyzes the impact of race on the construction of the decision-making standards of the Brazilian judiciary. To this end, the text first outlines the field of research “law and race relations” in Brazil and its contributions to thinking about the legal system. Subsequently, the article works on the roots of Brazilian law in the light of the history of slavery and racism. Thus, the concept of “seigneurial hermeneutics” is presented, which synthesizes patterns of Brazilian legal culture based on an anti-Black legal interpretation contrary to positive law. Finally, the text investigates the permanence and reinvention of these standards through a quantitative and qualitative approach and analyzes case studies of judicial lawsuits in the Federal District in Criminal, Civil, and Labor court systems, in which the Black population appears as victims. The research concludes that the judicial truth regime on Black women and men presents three structuring elements: the devaluation of Black suffering, the disregard for their word, and the erasure of racial violence. Thus, the judiciary plays a fundamental role in associating the Black population with the zone of non-being through the construction and legitimation of zones of illegality in the actions of the State.