A aplicação do instituto punitive damages nos contratos massificados

Abstract

In the face of technological advances, the market has improved. Just as the emergence of new products and new forms of consumption, big companies also started to look for different ways of making a profit. As a result of this process, there was a massification of contractual relations, which eventually affected the relationship between consumer and supplier. Proponents of this mass consumer market, large suppliers have daily faced consumer protection legislation and harmed many of their customers in the certainty that such injuries and violations will be profitable, given that a minimal portion of their public will claim in court, and that the value of any convictions will be insignificant. In view of this reality, the present study, through a study carried out in a national bibliography and using the dialectical-Marxist method, analyzes the social effectiveness of the levels of indemnification practiced by the Judiciary in conflicts involving consumers and suppliers, as well as the legal and social practices in Brazil that allow the use of the institute punitive damages as one of the tools to promote effective accountability of these agents in the consumer market, punishing their conduct and discouraging the practice of similar conduct.