DEFERENCE, TRUST, AND INSTITUTIONAL CO-AUTHORSHIP: FOUNDATIONS FOR A NEW PARADIGM OF PUBLIC AUDIT

Abstract

The text proposes a theoretical reconfiguration of Public Control in Brazil, starting from the idea that its current rationality remains anchored in a paradigm of distrust and institutional punitivism. Grounded in an integrated reading of the Law of Introduction to the Rules of Brazilian Law (Law No. 13.655/2018) and the Public Procurement and Contracts Law (Law No. 14.133/2021), the study advocates the necessity of consolidating a legal microsystem for contractual preservation, structured around the principles of proportionality, consequentialist reasoning, and administrative deference as an institutional virtue. It argues that deference – understood as a form of rational self-restraint and recognition of the technical, political, and epistemic legitimacy of administrative choices – does not imply distancing oneself from legality, but rather entails its most mature and dialogical expression. Inspired by the American deference doctrine, Luhmann’s theory of systemic trust, and the consequentialist rationality proposed by Vanice Lírio do Valle and Gustavo Binenbojm, the study proposes a reinterpretation of the role of Courts of Accounts in the field of Public Control, transforming them from mere sanctioning bodies into co-authors of administrative decisions. The study concludes that administrative deference and institutional trust constitute the pillars of a new cooperative accountability model, so to speak, oriented toward learning, proportionality, and public governance, capable of reconciling control and management under a unified logic of democratic rationality.