The minister who changed Justice

Learn the story of Márcio Thomaz Bastos in the words of President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and professionals and friends who shared with him his most decisive moments, such as the major reform in the history of the Brazilian Judiciary.

Márcio Thomaz Bastos was one of the most prominent lawyers the Brazilian legal world has ever known. His life trajectory is intertwined with key moments in recent history. In the 1970s, he began working for the Brazilian Bar Association. During this period of closed political regime and severe political repression, he became involved with social movements and began defending the metalworkers of the ABC region, a time when he met trade unionist Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. In the following decades, he worked on the prosecution of Chico Mendes' murderers, played a prominent role in the 1987–1988 Constituent Assembly, and participated in drafting the impeachment petition against President Fernando Collor de Mello.

With Lula's victory in the 2002 presidential election, Thomaz Bastos took over the Ministry of Justice and launched a quiet revolution. He successfully approved the creation of the National Council of Justice, an institution that established external oversight of the Judiciary, and reorganized the Federal Police, proposing a new organizational structure and reinforcing it materially.

This book brings together accounts from professionals who participated in the historic changes he implemented at the Ministry of Justice, a rarity for a country not accustomed to thinking about the public sector, even in the face of successful policies. Thomaz Bastos's administration was guided by the same principles he followed in defending the 1988 Constitution: deepening democracy, always with a focus on social justice.

With a foreword by Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and texts by: Antenor Pereira Madruga Filho, Antonio Claudio Mariz de Oliveira, Arthur Sanchez Badin, Augusto de Arruda Botelho, Beto Vasconcelos, Carolina Yumi de Souza, Dora Cavalcanti, Luis Felipe Salomão, Luiz Armando Badin, Marcelo Behar, Mario Cesar Carvalho, Paulo Lacerda, Pedro Abramovay, Pierpaolo Cruz Bottini, Sérgio Renault.