The Public Defender s Office is defined in article 134 of the Federal Constitution as an expression and instrument of the democratic regime. However, when analyzing the political model adopted to define its governance, it is observed that only a small portion of the community that makes up the institution holds political rights. In this context, where institutional citizenship is exercised exclusively by members of the Public Defender career, the question arises regarding the possibility of a public institution being partially democratic, or whether, conversely, the democratic ideal should be considered an absolute value. Focusing on the Public Defender s Office of the State of Rio de Janeiro, this study is structured in two parts. The first aims to present to the reader the particularities of the object, and the theoretical references that underpinned the proposed critical analysis, with emphasis on the discussion of the following topics: republicanism, democracy, and representativeness. The second part, in turn, problematizes the power dynamics in the institution, based on statements collected from the different categories that make up the institutional community, and, based on the experience of public universities, proposes an electoral model compatible with the theoretical references adopted in the research and with the constitutional design of the institution. As a result, it was concluded that the legal norm is used as an instrument of legitimation for the political power of the ruling class, which selects minority theoretical references to support its model. Additionally, it was highlighted the confusion between the representation of the defenders class and the representation of the Public Defender s Office itself, which, consequently, results in a situation of subordination and invisibility of the other members of the institutional community.