Prof. Murillo Gutier
E-mail: murillo@gutier.adv.br
Abstract
This article examines the contemporary practice of the Brazilian Federal Supreme Court (STF) through three theoretical perspectives: Günther Jakobs‘s Criminal Law of the Enemy (Feindstrafrecht), Eugenio Raúl Zaffaroni‘s critical analysis of the structural selectivity of the criminal system, and the historical-comparative examination of Nazi criminal law doctrine. Part I establishes the methodological standpoint: an exercise in constitutional vigilance that constitutes neither institutional hostility toward the STF nor a defense of coup-mongering, but rather seeks to name the dogmatic mobilizations of punitive power.
Parts II through V develop the three analytical perspectives: Jakobs’s conceptual architecture of the Feindstrafrecht with its three structural pillars (anticipation of punishability, disproportionality of penalties, procedural flexibilization), the Zaffaronian critique of the enemy as an absolutist remnant and the thesis of structural selectivity from In Search of Lost Penalties, and the Nazi legacy of dogmatic structures — Volksgemeinschaft, Willensstrafrecht, gesundes Volksempfinden, Tätertyp, Volksgerichtshof, and Unternehmen — that persist in attenuated forms.
Part VI applies the three perspectives to the relevant STF precedents (Inquiry No. 4,781, ADPF 572, AP 1060, AP 2508, AP 2668), identifies seven structural homologies with Nazi criminal law, and draws the essential distinction: it is a difference of degree, not one of structure. Part VII answers the three central questions: the STF has partially adopted the Jakobsian model, fully reproduced Zaffaroni’s selectivity model, and mobilized Nazi dogmatic structures without sharing their axiological content. The conclusion is an exercise in strict constitutional vigilance in the Zaffaronian sense.
Keywords: Criminal Law of the Enemy; Criminal Law of the Citizen; Günther Jakobs; Eugenio Raúl Zaffaroni; Structural Selectivity; STF; Cognitive Guarantee; Volksgemeinschaft; Willensstrafrecht; Tätertyp; Police State; Nazi Criminal Law Doctrine; Defensive Democracy.
The Criminal Law of the Enemy in the Federal Supreme Court – Murillo Gutier (3 downloads )