BRAZIL Law and Practice Contributed by: Ricardo Barretto Ferreira da Silva and Camila Sabino Del Sasso, Azevedo Sette Advogados
Azevedo Sette Advogados 11th Floor International Plaza II Building 1327 Presidente Juscelino Kubitschek Avenue
04543-011 São Paulo Brazil
Tel: +55 11 4083 7600 Fax: +55 11 4083 7601 Email: barretto@azevedosette.com.br Web: www.azevedosette.com.br
1. Legal System 1.1 Legal System and Judicial Order Brazil follows a civil law system influenced by Roman-Germanic legal tradition, with laws codi - fied and applied through judicial interpretation. In this system, legislation is the primary source of law, which encompasses the Brazilian Federal Constitution of 1988 (the “Constitution”), laws, decrees, regulations, circulars, ordinances, and other normative rules issued by governmental authorities. At the top of hierarchy of legal sources is the Constitution. All laws and regulations must com - ply with its provisions, and any that conflict with the Constitution may be deemed null and void. There are additional sources of law, which include: • analogy; • customary practices; • legal doctrine; and • contracts or other instruments from private autonomous power.
Judicial decisions are not considered formal legal sources but they serve as a support for the interpretation of the law and for decision- making by the courts. Also, they generally do not have a binding precedent in the way com - mon law systems do – although higher court rul - ings may have persuasive or binding authority in certain contexts (eg, decisions of the Federal Supreme Court or the Superior Court of Justice in specific cases). The judicial order in Brazil is divided into federal and state levels, which have their own courts that correspond with specific areas of jurisdic - tion defined by the Constitution. The judiciary operates independently from the executive and legislative branches. Cases typically begin in first-instance courts and may be appealed to higher courts. At the state level, most civil and criminal cases are handled by state courts, whereas the federal courts deal with issues involving federal laws or government entities. There are also special courts and tribunals such as small-claims courts ( juizados especiais ), mili -
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