A revisão judicial dos contratos escolares durante a pandemia do Covid-19

Abstract

In view of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, several contracts had to be adapted due to the supervening change in the circumstances in which the deal had been signed. In the case of educational contracts, the closure of schools and the impact on income and work of the consumers implied a series of lawsuits aiming a reduction of the value of school fees. Thus, in order to analyze this situation, this work began with a search for the parameters of contractual review acording the brazilian law, based on the Consumer Protection Code and the Civil Code of 2002, emphasizing the mitigation of the principle of mandatory force of the contract, as well as the theory of breach of the objective basis of the legal business and the theorie of unpredictability. After selecting a parameter, the details of the educational contracts were outlined, which have specific regulatory legislation, in order to investigate, as problematics, whether it would be possible to plead for a judicial review of educational contracts based on the excessive burden that arises in the context of the pandemic of COVID-19, if a supposed extreme advantage of schools with the closure of establishments would be a relevant basis for such a review and if the unpredictability of the impact from the pandemic of COVID-19 would be one of the requirements to be granted the review of contracts. Ultimately, this work analyzed all these points through a paradigm case of the Public Civil Action nº 0710892- 92.2020.8.02.0001, filed by the Public Ministry of the State of Alagoas, with the aim of reducing school fees of more than 148 schools in Alagoas.