The inertia of monoculturalism: teacher education in law and the paradox of the 1988 constitution

Abstract

The present article investigates the structural paradox inherent in Brazilian legal education following the 1988 Federal Constitution. Although the "Citizen Constitution" established a pluralistic, multicultural, and guarantee-based framework, pedagogical practices in Law schools remain anchored in a monocultural and formalistic logic. The central hypothesis argues that the persistence of this scenario stems from an institutional "blind spot": the lack of pedagogical training for Law professors, who tend to reproduce a pre-1988 heritage centered on technical dogmatism. The objective of this article is to analyze how this historical training structures pedagogical practices marked by formalism and eurocentrism, producing processes of epistemicide, and to point out possibilities for reconfiguration based on Critical Multicultural Pedagogy.  Methodologically, this study is a qualitative theoretical research based on a critical bibliographic review of classical works in higher education and the sociology of law. It analyzes how the absence of pedagogical and multicultural knowledge perpetuates "epistemicide"—both territorial and racial—as theorized by Souza Filho and Carneiro. The study concludes by proposing a new epistemological-pedagogical configuration oriented by Critical Multicultural Pedagogy and mediated by new technologies. This transition is presented as a necessary condition to transform the "jurist-bachelor" into a "jurist-educator," capable of fulfilling the transformative promise of the 1988 constitutional project.