Danos punitivos: análise do instituto como meio de inibição de condutas lesivas de fornecedores em face de consumidores

Abstract

This work seeks to verify the need and viability of the introduction of a third category of damage in the material reach of Consumer Law. Also, it analyses the Brazilian conjecture on Civil Liability in consumer relations using the approach of Law & Economics. It studies, then, new characteristics that jurisprudence and authors have attributed to general damage, highlighting their unviability in producing relevant effects by legal prohibition. In this manner, it shows the institute of punitive damages as an alternative to the established system, listing assumptions to its imposition based in the pragmatic decisions of the Supreme Court of the United States of America, country in which the punitive damages doctrine is found with greater development. In this tendency, the research is classified as descriptive and applied and it is guided by a bibliographic analysis regarding the historical and evolutional aspects of the presented institutes, other than highlighting important, national and foreign, jurisprudential cases with the goal of illustrating the argumentation. In the end, it concludes that the current scenario of supplier’s civil responsibility for acts against consumers is inefficient, due to justice slowness, the inefficiency of executive agencies of consumer defense, the large characterization of harmful situations as mere annoyances and the low value of the compensations, as consequence of the legal prohibition of enrichment without cause. So, it defends the adoption of punitive damages, by means of legislative innovation, to remedy the situation.