Fernando Alcoforado*
According to the Greek philosopher Aristotle, man is a social and political animal by nature. And if man is a political animal, it means that he has a natural need to live in society, to promote the common good and happiness. With the theses of Niccolò Machiavelli, exposed in his work The Prince, the conception of Aristotle of politics as a search for justice and the common good falls by the wayside. In each historical epoch, the foundation of politics and the state for Machiavelli is the maintenance of political power by the ruling classes. For Machiavelli, the essential purpose of politics is, in short, to conquer and maintain power. It is based on this view that Machiavelli coined his famous and most controversial phrase: the ends justify the means.
The thesis that the ends justify the means applies to the political reality in which Brazil lives, which is far from resembling paradise or the positivist harmony of order and progress, the motto of the Brazilian flag. The political, economic and social order remains in Brazil in iron and fire, hiding the relations and mechanisms of exploitation by the use of justice and the state repressive apparatus, whenever it is necessary, and the progress has been constituted in a true illusion. In the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, the illusion that Brazil would walk inexorably toward progress was buried. In Brazil, Aristotle’s conception of politics as a search for justice and the common good has never been applied, but Machiavelli’s view that the foundation of politics and the state is the maintenance of political power.
It is legitimate that the ends justify the means used, but only insofar as these means do not contradict the intended ends. This means that not everything that is done is acceptable. It is only acceptable that which contributes to the attainment of the desired end and does not mean the negation of it. With Machiavelli, politics ceases to be thought from ethics and religion. In this sense, Machiavelli represents a double rupture: with the classics of Greco-Roman antiquity and medieval Christian values. In Machiavelli, politics identifies itself with the space of power as an activity on which the collective existence is based and which has priority over the other spheres of human life. Politics merges with objective reality, with the concrete problems of relations between men. The policy described in The Prince of Machiavelli with countless examples drawn from the history more resembles Dante’s hell than the promised paradise.
By liberating politics from religious morality, Machiavelli made explicit his earthly character and made it something that could be assimilated by the commoners of mortals. It is not by chance that Machiavellianism has become synonymous with a political practice devoid of ethics, morality and good faith, a cunning and rogue procedure. The panorama of Brazilian politics throughout its history and in the current conjuncture reflects the postulates of Machiavelli, although most of our rulers have not read The Prince. Despite this, many politicians act according to the principles contained in Machiavelli’s work, which are based on a utilitarian, pragmatic view based on the rational calculation of the cost / benefit ratio.
Politics should be pursued on the basis of ethics and morals. Emphasize that Ethics is the way that man should behave in his social environment. In turn, Moral is a set of norms that regulate the behavior of man in society, and these norms are acquired by education, tradition and everyday life. The term Ethics represents a set of moral values and principles that should guide human conduct in society. Ethics serves to establish rules of conduct that ensure the balance and the proper functioning of society, ensuring that no one is harmed. In this sense, Ethics is related to the feeling of social justice. From the point of view of Philosophy, Ethics is a science that studies the values and moral principles of a society and its groups.
Each society and each social group have their own codes of ethics. Besides the general principles that guide social functioning, there is also the ethics of certain specific groups or places. In this sense, ethics of the judiciary, medical ethics, work ethics, engineering ethics, business ethics, educational ethics, sports ethics, journalistic ethics, ethics in politics, etc. can be cited. In turn, the study of the character of the individual and customs is called moral. Ethics and Moral become synonymous, designating the same object and the same field of philosophical inquiry.
Former Judge Sérgio Moro, who excelled in defending the noble purpose of the fight against corruption, used means devoid of ethics, morals and good faith by acting illegally in his punitive action in Lava Jato Operation in collusion with members of the Public Prosecutor’s Office of Paraná practicing procedural fraud against defendants. The exchange of messages by an application between Judge Sérgio Moro – current Minister of Justice and Public Security – and Attorney of the Republic Deltan Dallagnol, recently revealed by The Intercept Brasil, violate the principles of basic independence and neutrality in Judiciary in Brazil and in various parts of the world, according to international lawyers and scholars.
If the judge is a true magistrate who presides over the trial, then it would be wrong and problematic for him to be discussing prosecution strategies, openly or not with prosecutors. The messages indicate that Moro would have suggested to the Federal Public Ministry to change the order of phases of the operation, indicated a witness, anticipating at least one judicial decision and advised the prosecutor on the scope of the prosecution. The facts reported by The Intercept Brazil website show that Moro has committed serious ethical violations. The relationship of judges with the parties (prosecution and defense) is well founded in articles 8 and 9 of the Code of Ethics of the Magistracy (http://www.cnj.jus.br/publicacoes/codigo-de-etica-da-magistratura) described below:
Art. 8 The impartial magistrate is one who seeks in the evidence the truth of the facts, with objectivity and foundation, maintaining throughout the process an equivalent distance from the parties, and avoids any kind of behavior that may reflect favoritism, predisposition or prejudice.
Art. 9 – The magistrate, in the performance of his activity, must grant the parties equal treatment, without any kind of unjustified discrimination.
With the behavior of ex-judge Sergio Moro devoid of ethics and moral is demonstrated that he acted based on the Machiavellian principle that the ends justify the means against the ethics of the judiciary and the highest moral principles acting equal the defendants punished by him that assaulted the public coffers to the detriment of the Brazilian population. By acting illegally in Operation Lava Jato, Sérgio Moro may to put in check the judgments made that are characterized by the partiality practiced by him. Sérgio Moro did not follow the teachings of the great Brazilian jurist, Ruy Barbosa, who affirmed that “justice, blind to one side, is no longer justice. It must be seen equally to the right and to the left “and that” there is nothing more relevant to social life than the formation of the feeling of justice. Moreover, Sérgio Moro did not adopt one of the great commandments of Ruy Barbosa based on the phrase lapidar: “With the law, by the law and within the law; for out of the law there is no salvation”.
* Fernando Alcoforado, 79, awarded the medal of Engineering Merit of the CONFEA / CREA System, member of the Bahia Academy of Education, engineer and doctor in Territorial Planning and Regional Development by the University of Barcelona, university professor and consultant in the areas of strategic planning, business planning, regional planning and planning of energy systems, is the author of 14 books addressing issues such as Globalization and Development, Brazilian Economy, Global Warming and Climate Change, The Factors that Condition Economic and Social Development, Energy in the world and The Great Scientific, Economic, and Social Revolutions that Changed the World.
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