A JUDICIALIZAÇÃO DO DIREITO À EDUCAÇÃO INFANTIL NA COMARCA DE TRÊS LAGOAS – MS: reflexões sobre a aplicabilidade da teoria da reserva do possível

Abstract

The present article addresses the legal conflict between the right to early childhood education and the “reserve of the possible” doctrine. It seeks to analyze whether this theory can be invoked to justify noncompliance with the right to early childhood education. To this end, a documentary survey was conducted on the website of the Court of Justice of Mato Grosso do Sul (TJMS), selecting the period from 2014 to 2025 as the temporal scope and the judicial district of Três Lagoas as the territorial scope. After cataloging the decisions, a literature review was undertaken to support a qualitative analysis of their content, with the aim of assessing whether the Judiciary has accepted the reserve of the possible as a valid argument for the municipal administration to exempt itself from its obligation to provide and guarantee early childhood education for children.The study found a strong similarity among the decisions issued by judges in response to defendants’ arguments, showing that, during this period, the right to a place in early childhood education was treated as a priority, and generic allegations of lack of vacancies or enrollment difficulties were rejected.