The purpose of this article is to rescue the debate about the direction of corporatism in Brazil after the democratization, as well as to assess the impact of the recent institutional changes on the system of interest intermediation. The resumption of the corporatist approach on the international literature allows for a counterpoint to the internal debate, as it reinforces the importance of the organizational dimensions and the "mode of decision making" to characterize the corporatist interest intermediation. The argument points to the strengthening of the trade union structure, particularly of its top organizations, and to the multiplication and consolidation of several tripartite arenas responsible for the definition of important issues of public policy. These new traces seem to place the Brazilian model of corporatism closer to the "societal" type, as opposed to pluralism.
Corporatism; Unionism; Political institutions; Democracy