This edited book focuses on the most controversial aspects of assistance benefits as mandated by the Brazilian Constitution of 1988 - and the challenges that have merged since the approval, in 1993, of the Federal Act 8.742, also known as Organic Law of Social Assistance. This collection of essays allows the reader to understand some important changes in social assistance policies in Brazil in recent years, having the General Theory of Social Security and the Human Rights as references. The tensions between economic principles and affirmative policies for the less advantaged parts of the society are also covered, showing how different interpretations of key concepts - like need, poverty or family - may have an important role on the exercise of fundamental rights.

Marco Aurélio Serau Junior is a lawyer with a PhD in Human Rights from University of São Paulo, Brazil. His fields of research are social security, access to justice and critical examination of jurisprudence on social security. José Ricardo Caetano Costa is a lawyer and a professor at the Law School of the Federal University of Rio Grande, Brazil. He has a PhD in Social Service from Pontifical Catholic University of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. His fields of research include social securities, public policies, social assistance and environment.