Mediação tributária: acesso à justiça, princípios e práticas

Abstract

Alternative dispute resolution (ADR) have been increasingly used around the world as an option to the traditional judicial system, both due to the speed of procedures in relation to the judicial process and the cost reduction it promotes for citizens and the State. In this sense, the ADR that provides greater autonomy and security to the user is mediation, which is widely accepted in several legal areas. Mediation is the consensual procedure in which a neutral third party leads the parties to dialogue and the formation of an agreement, ending the dispute and preserving human relationships. Tax law now also enters mediation, revolutionizing the form of relationship between tax authorities and taxpayers and adapting it to the agile and complex characteristics of contemporary times. Thus, tax mediation arises. However, as it is still an innovation, the procedure lacks specific literature and the definition of operating principles and rules. This work has the mission of understanding what tax mediation is as access to justice and its relationships with constitutional tax principles and the principles of mediation. With these definitions in hand, legal practitioners will have a theoretical and practical basis for working in tax mediation. Thus, the research problem lies in the lack of specific literature on tax mediation, given its pioneering implementation in the city of Porto Alegre and the existence of a bill under consideration in the National Congress, which should extend its application throughout the country. The general objective of the research, therefore, is to establish parameters for the application of tax mediation in Brazil, while the specific objectives are based on understanding how mediation identifies itself as a means of access to justice, as well as how it can comply with constitutional tax principles and mediation principles, in addition to establishing practices that are consistent with the reality of taxpayers and tax authorities. As for the methodology, essentially outlined through bibliographical research, the research presents an exploratory component, and, since the research topic is incipient in society and lacks literature, including in other countries, it will inevitably encompass the investigation of similar legal institutes for the application or adaptation of their concepts to the practice of tax mediation. The research results present a little-explored facet of the doctrine of mediation, which is the justice of the procedure. The combination of the application of the relatively abstract principles of mediation with the considerable rigidity of tax precepts finds harmonization in the collaborative essence of tax mediation as a means of access to justice.