The article compares ideas prevailing at the São Paulo Justice Court with that of the Association of Judges for Democracy and the public image of judges in printed media. It relates the distinct contents of those ideas to theories of civic professionalism and democratic professionalism. The analysis is based on the conception that there is a pluralization of identity forms of professional groups and that those identifications are a result of negotiated construction between peers, competitors, and the public. Therefore, professional groups' publications and mainstream media are relevant instruments to investigate the process of negotiation about judges' professional identity. The database includes content analysis of the texts about judges or written by them, published on the newspaper Folha de São Paulo from 1996 to 2002; of the news section and speeches published on São Paulo Justice Court's journal Revista de Jurisprudência from 1968 to 1997 and articles on the newspaper Juízes para a Democracia from 1992 to 2002. Each of those collections was classified in four broad themes. focusing on professional ideas, judges' relations to other State powers, the interprofessional and intraprofessional relations and interests expressed by them. The study compares those three bases in order to form a broad picture of São Paulo judges and chief judges' collective identifications.
Magistracy; Professionalism; Ideologies; Cognitive struggles; Identity representations