Características jurídicas do mercado brasileiro de audiovisual: a construção da Lei 12.485 de 2011 e seus desdobramentos

The Law n.º 12.485 of 2011 was designed in order to reform the regulatory apparatus of the Brazilian subscription television market. In that context the increment in competition, the need for the promotion of diverse sources of information, the prevention of economic concentration and the promotion of national economic and social development are listed as some of the most important justifications for its enactment. Aiming to achieve these objectives, the Act creates multiple provisions destined to establish coordination mechanisms that will affect agents actions in the market, control mechanisms over the market's structure and also the imposition of obligations related to the broadcasting of independent national productions. On the other hand, these justifications by themselves are not enough to comprehend what are the main changes brought by the new legislation e what they represent to the regulated market. This is so because the debates about the introduction of a regulatory reform were characterized by a intense dispute among different antagonizing interest groups and who were inserted in a very peculiar political and economic scenario. Thus, the analysis of the reform of the audiovisual regulation must go beyond the mere comparison between legal drafts and investigate in a depth-wise manner a series of elements that have influenced the construction of the sector's new regulatory framework, as well as the real motifs to this reformulation of the legal rules. In order to do that, the purpose of this dissertation is to rebuild this process, assessing the background of the regulation, in which manner the national market was consolidated, who are its most important agents, the economic context at the time of the reforms, how did the legislative process elapsed until the approval of its final text, so, just then, point out the most relevant features of the new law and how it influences the sector. Furthermore, it also seeks to identify the eventual problems and challenges that may arise from this process as to the market development, as to the good functioning of regulation itself, outweighing the inherent risk linked to the adoption of different strategies, taking into account the diverse aspects presented previously.