Abstract
This study analyzes the trajectory of the Brazilian Center for Health Studies (Centro Brasileiro de Estudos da Saúde, Cebes) between 1976 and 1986. Its members devoted part of their time to communicating proposals for transforming the organization of sanitation in the country, presenting scenarios for the reformulation of its health policy. In this thesis, special attention is given to the members of Cebes who debated and took action on issues relating to the reformulation of the country’s health policy. The study is restricted to the analysis of Saúde em Debate, a periodical published by Cebes, because of the importance it had in the area throughout the ten years until the Unified Health System (Sistema Único de Saúde, SUS) was established at the 8th National Conference on Health. The journal was selected as a source and object of study in a bid to understand its role in articulating the work of researchers and Brazil’s public health agenda. One of the focuses adopted relates to the involvement of the researchers and the academic community in its communication through this periodical. The research focuses on assessing how they developed this aspect of their work and sheds light on the target readership. The aim is to give a broader view of Saúde em Debate: the profile of its contributors, the topics that appeared most often, the subjects that were prioritized, and the authors who published most in the decade in question. By so doing, I aim to demonstrate its importance to the process that has since come to be known as the Sanitation Reform. More than a communication channel, it becomes clear that Saúde em Debate actually constituted a point of convergence between multiple interests, and an important medium for the formation and formulation of SUS.