Desinformação e processo eleitoral brasileiro: enfrentamento à luz da liberdade de expressão e informação

Abstract

The present work analyzes possible measures the State, through the legislative and the Judiciary systems, and social media platforms can employ to contain the spread of misinformation during the electoral period without unreasonably limiting freedom of expression and information. Freedom of speech is fundamental to any democratic society because it allows free flow of information and ideas between individuals, which help them to truly understand topics of collective interest, to build a qualified public debate, to choose their representatives and to enhance governmental policies. This study is motivated by the increasing use of false content, including fake news, by elected politicians and their supporters with the intention of tarnishing the integrity of the electoral process, distorting citizens' perception, which can cause serious impacts to democracy, the quality of population's vote and the legitimacy of the electoral process. This research focuses on the general elections held in Brazil in 2018 and 2022. This work concludes that misinformation is harmful to the free market of ideas because it gives no contribution to public debate; in order to create effective laws to help society it is necessary to precisely define misinformation conceptually, hence simply criminalizing a loosely defined act may not be the ideal path to solve this issue; the Judiciary system is acting proactively to solve the problems caused by misinformation, often times going beyond its scope; it is necessary to regulate social media platforms to stop fake news from spreading. The methodology used is of an eminently qualitative nature, through a bibliographic, legislative and jurisprudential research, with an exploratory and descriptive approach.