Labour unions in Brazil emerged in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, initially influenced by migrant workers. The legal framework evolved through multiple constitutional periods, characterised by significant changes in state control and workers' rights. From 1937 to 1967, a corporatist approach dominated, with state intervention restricting union autonomy and strike rights. A Constitution[1] 1988 marked a pivotal transformation, banning state interference in union organisation, expanding strike rights and allowing workers to be represented in companies. O jurist[2] Amauri Mascaro Nascimento has critically analysed this transition from a controlled union model to a more autonomous one. This constitutional reform represented a fundamental change in the law[3] Brazilian trade unions, going from a system[4] restrictive and controlled by the state[5] to one that emphasises workers' rights, collective bargaining and organisational pluralism.
Trade union law is a branch that is characterised by regulating the legal relationships between the employer and the workers represented by a union.
According to Amauri Mascaro Nascimento, it is "the branch of labour law that aims to study collective labour relations, and these are legal relations that have groups of people as subjects and collective interests as their objective".
Thus, not all collective labour relations are characterised as trade union, since there are other collective subjects besides trade unions. Relationships between non-union labour representation and companies are a case in point.
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