THE JUDGED THING IN COLLECTIVE ACTIONS: EFFECTIVENESS AND GUARANTEE OF LEGAL SECURITY

Abstract

This article presents a study on res judicata resulting from collective judicial protection. With the social and political evolution, mainly after the Federal Constitution of 1988, homogeneous transindividual and individual rights were materially guaranteed, which go beyond the individual sphere. The emergence of these collective rights demonstrated the need for a differentiated and wide jurisdictional protection, leading the legislator to create a collective procedural microsystem, with the objective of expanding access to Justice and effecting the judicial protection of transindividual rights. Bearing in mind that the traditional civil process is eminently focused on the protection of intersubjective relations, the res judicata institute had to be harmonized with the new reality. For this purpose, the general aspects related to res judicata in civil proceedings are approached, and then to investigate res judicata in collective proceedings: concept, species, functions and objective and subjective limits. At the end, it carries out an analysis of the applicability of article 16 of Law 7,347 / 85 (Law of Public Civil Action), with regard to the territorial limitation of collective res judicata.