EXTRAJUDICIAL AND JUDICIAL INSTRUMENTS OF ECOLOGICAL PROTECTION: THE IMPORTANCE OF ENVIRONMENTAL MEDIATION AND THE CIVIL PROCEDURE

Abstract

This article proposes an analysis of the political-legal context of environmental governance as a crucial tool in the execution and implementation of the ecological constitutional regime through the Judiciary. However, it should be noted that this is not the only way to resolve conflicts. With the shift away from the liberal-individualist conception in favor of the growing recognition of social demands of a plural and collective nature, accompanied by the massification of demands and hyperjudicialization, mediation begins to play an increasingly prominent role in environmental conflicts. It is important to note that, especially when one of the parties involved is a legal entity governed by public law, mediation receives specific treatment in a chapter of Law No. 13.140/15. Given this panorama, viewing the Justice System merely as a “System of Access to the Judiciary” becomes increasingly unsustainable. In the current political-legal context, this system transcends this definition, encompassing the legal status of citizenship in Brazil. Institutions should, whenever possible, adopt the route of extrajudicial conflict resolution and facilitate access to information, thus guaranteeing fundamental rights, including the right to an ecologically balanced environment.