88

This paper analyzes the determinants of the critical legal studies movement that emerged in Brazil in the 1990s. It focuses on two spaces of legal production and use: academia, and practical legal careers. The dual legitimization of critical legal studies constructed in opposition to the Brazilian legal tradition takes place in the narrow correspondence between a space producing new legal definitions and a space of mobilization of these definitions in order to establish the uses of judicial power. In this sense, it can be read as a process linked to the relocation of jurists within spheres of power in Brazil. Such a phenomenon is part of alterations in the political context of the country.