A category in dispute: definitions and negotiations around the temporary worker in the processing of the Estatuto do Trabalhador Rural (1960-1963)

Abstract

In this article, I intend to analyze how brazilian parliamentarians discussed the legal situation of temporary workers in the historical process of creating labor legislation for rural areas in Brazil. To this end, the annals of the Chamber of Deputies between 1960 and 1963 will be examined, a period that marks the passage of the law project that gave rise to the Estatuto do Trabalhador Rural (ETR), a law that guaranteed rural workers the rights that until then, were only guaranteed to urban wage earners, by the Consolidação das Leis do Trabalho (CLT) - with adaptations to rural labor. Despite the fact that the ETR does not include the figure of the temporary worker in most of its devices, this does not mean that this professional category has been inserted, debated, negotiated or even deliberately removed from the text without discussions in the specialized committees or in the plenary of the Chamber of Deputies. To better understand these debates, books written by politicians who actively participated in those parliamentary sessions and works produced by eminent Labor lawyers of that time will also be used.