Covid-19 and Protection of Rights in Federal Judiciary: Actors, Interests and Issue Areas of the Pandemic Judicialization

Abstract

This paper estimates a statistical model that explains the factors that have determined the judicial protection of rights in cases related to the theme covid-19 in the Brazilian Federal Judiciary. Using multilevel statistical analysis method, the results revealed that the probabilities of obtaining judicial protection depends of a complex interaction between procedural characteristics that identify the profiles of authors, their underlying interests and the topic involved in the discussion. Analyses of the different lawsuit profiles also showed that states, the Federal District and municipalities were the most successful authors in obtaining favorable judicial decisions in demands associated with the subject of making the application of legal rules more flexible. The model also suggests that the Federal Judiciary did not allow itself to be contaminated with “polarization”, preferring, for legal reasons, the maintenance of the status quo to allocating rights in favor of authors from any of the extremes of the current political moment.