This article concludes the first cycle of a successful partnership between the Center for Research in Teaching and Innovation (CEPI-FGV) and Sigalei. 

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Precisely because it is the last article of this first and very successful stage of the partnership, which completes one year, it is only fair to address something that motivates the institutional actions of both CEPI and Sigalei: the improvement of public policies and the qualification of the debate within civil society. Particularly, through the private representation of interests, government relations, or, simply, lobbying.

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Remember our Partnership 

But first, let's recall some of the topics that have already been discussed in the context of this partnership. The approach to relevant themes at the national level can be verified by the diversity of topics and spheres of the Powers studied and evaluated: we have everything from mappings regarding bills on telemedicine, highlighting the federal legislative debate; passing through bills on cryptocurrencies and crypto assets and the difficulties of legislative and regulatory monitoring in Brazil. The discussion on the various facets of the gig economy in the Legislative Power of the city of São Paulo was also researched; besides national highlights of bills on higher education. Research was conducted on how to understand the fight against hate speech in Brazil; on the mapping and monitoring of the reform context of the Copyright Law and on the theme of health and innovation, or “e-health”. Finally, projects intending to alter the General Personal Data Protection Law and dealing with Algorithms and Artificial Intelligence in the Chamber and the Senate were addressed. Phew!

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Access all articles published by this partnership in the link below:

CEPI + Sigalei Partnership Articles 

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Regulated lobbying for qualifying public debate 

The idea of writing an article on lobbying represents the intention to communicate all these contributions in the most transparent way possible. In a country where lobbying is regulated, the ultimate goal of regulation is, precisely, to make this communication open to interested parties, so that there is parity and symmetry of information, so that it is known who said what to whom and when. However, it is debated whether initiatives in this sense really foster an increase in transparency, or just impose more obstacles and bureaucracy for communication between public and private actors. We will see, below, which propositions are currently being processed (May/2022), in the Federal Legislative Power and deal with the theme.

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The research was done in early May/2022, with the term “lobby” in bills being processed in the Chamber of Deputies (CD) and the Federal Senate (SF). It brought 26 (twenty-six) results, of which 21 (twenty-one) were discarded for only bringing the term “lobby” incidentally, that is, not having the regulation of the activity as their objective, only mentioning it in the justification, when dealing with the specific topic on the agenda. 

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Therefore, 5 (five) propositions remained, whose syllabuses follow below and are arranged in order of presentation:

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  1. CD PL 4391/2021: Provides for the private representation of interests carried out by natural or legal persons before public agents;
  2. CD PL 1961/2015: Disciplines the activity and actions of persons and pressure or interest groups within the scope of the Legislative and Executive Branches, and takes other measures;
  3. CD PL 1202/2007: Disciplines the activity of "lobbying" and the actions of pressure or interest groups and similar entities within the scope of organs and entities of the Federal Public Administration, and takes other measures;
  4. CD PL 6928/2002: Creates the Statute for the exercise of Participatory Democracy, regulating the execution of the provisions of items I, II and III of art. 14 of the Federal Constitution;
  5. CD PL 6132/1990: Provides for the registration of individuals or legal entities with the houses of the National Congress, for the purposes it specifies, and takes other measures.

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PL 4391/2021 advances in the Chamber of Deputies

All the propositions presented above dealt with the topic, to different degrees and with their own approaches. This opportunity will exclusively analyze PL 4391/2021, as it is the only proposition with a score on the Sigalei temperature radar (with 8.8 points, while all others had zero). This means that this proposition, so far, processed faster than 88% of all propositions of the same type in the same Legislative House, considering the propositions processed during the last 90 days. The temperature radar is a tool that allows the user to gauge the most recent movements of a given project, which makes it possible to focus attention – and any efforts in dialogue with parliamentarians – on bills with more recent movements. This is yet another important contribution of Sigalei to the activity of us, lobbyists.

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The project, authored by the Executive Branch, aims, according to its Justification, to provide for:

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  1. the private representation of interests carried out by individuals or legal entities before public agents of the Branches of the Union, States, Federal District and Municipalities, aiming to respect the principles of legality, impersonality, morality and publicity;
  2. the establishment of rules of transparency and integrity in the exercise of the private representation of interests before public agents;
  3. the definition of primary concepts involving the theme, such as  "private representation of interests", "interest representative", "gift", "freebie", "hospitality", among others considered pertinent;
  4. the provision of prohibitions and sanctions to public and private agents; and
  5. the provision of administrative accountability for interest representatives

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The justification of the PL itself mentions the fact that the draft project is the result of an effort by the Comptroller General of the Union (CGU), which started from the evaluation of the Substitute presented in 2018 by Deputy Cristiane Brasil (PTB-RJ) to PL 1202/2007, mentioned above. Still according to the Justification, the members of the CGU studied the best practices in the regulation of private representation of interests (or lobbying) around the world, and the proposition under analysis would be a direct result of this effort. The objective would be to make private representation of interests clearer, allowing for greater effectiveness in the repression of reprehensible conduct[1].

The PL 4391/2021 is structured as follows:

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  • Chapter I | PRELIMINARY PROVISIONS: determines to whom the provisions on private representation of interests carried out by an individual or legal entity before public agents would apply. An interesting fact is that the proposition presents definitions of the terms it uses, which can certainly be considered a good practice regarding legislative drafting, as it clarifies in detail what is being talked about when mentioning, for example, the expression “private representation of interests” or “interest representative”. Furthermore, it defines what is not considered private representation of interests;
  • Chapter II | ON PRIVATE REPRESENTATION OF INTERESTS BEFORE PUBLIC AGENTS: defines the principles of the activity, as well as the fact that audiences between public and private actors can be face-to-face or remote, for example;
  • Chapter III | ON TRANSPARENCY AND INTEGRITY IN THE PRIVATE REPRESENTATION OF INTERESTS: determines which authorities must obligatorily publish information regarding audiences with private interest representatives. 
  • Chapter IV | ON THE ACCOUNTABILITY REGIME: this chapter is divided into sections, namely: infractions committed (i) by public agents and (ii) by interest representatives. Both provide for sanctions.
  • Chapter V | ON THE ADMINISTRATIVE PROCESS OF ACCOUNTABILITY FOR THE INTEREST REPRESENTATIVE: according to this chapter, the initiation as well as the judgment of an administrative process to ascertain the responsibility of the interest representative fall to the highest authority of each organ or entity of the Executive, Legislative, and Judicial branches. These authorities would act ex officio or upon provocation.
  • Chapter VI | FINAL PROVISIONS: provides more details on the foreseen sanctions.

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The proposal considers private representation of interests to be the interaction between a private agent and a public agent with the objective of influencing the decision-making process or making decisions within public administration, such as in the formulation of a public policy, or the drafting of a normative act, such as an ordinance or decree. This interest representative, or lobbyist, can be any citizen (individual) or company (legal entity) dedicated to this activity, whether on their own behalf or on behalf of third parties, for remuneration or not.

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The transparency of these dialogues would arise, among other reasons, from the proposition's provisions regarding meetings, or audiences, with so-called lobbyists. These must be disclosed, as well as information published about audiences with Ministers of State, high-ranking civil servants, and congressmen. It is important to emphasize that, according to the proposal, it would be up to the States, Federal District, and municipalities to define specific rules on the disclosure of meeting information, provided that the general rules established in the (eventual) federal law are respected. The published agenda must identify not only the lobbyist and their clients, but also the interest on the agenda, which will be discussed on the occasion.

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It is important to highlight that the possibility of regulation by States, DF and municipalities can give rise to a myriad of regulations that would possibly impair exactly what the Bill intends to regulate. It is a point of attention to have regarding the current proposal. 

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This was, in short, the objective of this article: to present the overview of the most recent bill regarding the private representation of interests, or “lobbying”. We do not know if the proposal will be approved exactly as it was proposed, or if it will be subject to amendments or even a substitute, but we know that the intention to regulate the practice has been discussed in both Houses of the National Congress since the 1990s. We hope that, by regulating this interaction between the Government and private actors, the proposal achieves what it sets out to do: bring more transparency to the exchange of information, reduce informational asymmetries and make data dissemination more accessible. As we follow this discussion, I join the list of professionals who aspire for our performance to be considered strengthening democracy, precisely for representing and presenting distinct perspectives, for building bridges and promoting dialogue[2].

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I could not end this contribution without proper thanks to the CEPI and Sigalei teams. My special thanks to the entire Sigalei team, in the persons of Ivan Ervolino and Nayara Cortez, extremely attentive throughout this entire process, always reading the texts carefully, discussing suggestions, and helping researchers clear up all doubts regarding the platform. My thanks to the entire CEPI team, and nominally to the authors of the articles, in alphabetical order: Alice C. Gonçalves; Ana Carolina R. Dias Silveira; Ana Paula Camelo; Bruno Ett Bícego; Enya Carolina Silva da Costa; Fabrício Vasconcelos Gomes; Guilherme Forma Klafke; João Pedro Favaretto Salvador; Laurianne-Marie Schippers; Maria Eduarda Freire; Tatiane Guimarães and Victor Doering Xavier da Silveira.

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The next cycle will present reports using the platform in the context of broader CEPI projects. We will have robust contributions on a quarterly basis, with the participation of teams dealing with different projects at the Center. Bring on the next contributions to the debate!

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This article was written by Mariana Chaimovich — lawyer, PhD from the Institute of International Relations of the University of São Paulo, and master's degree in International Law from USP. She acts as a government relations consultant.

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References in the text:

[1] Information available at: https://www.camara.leg.br/noticias/863642-projeto-do-governo-regulamenta-atividade-de-lobby-no-brasil/

[2] This perception belongs exclusively to the author, and cannot be considered an institutional manifestation of either CEPI or Sigalei.

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