This article aims at theoretically discussing the role of argumentation in deliberative processes that occur in social control board instances of the Brazilian National Health System (SUS). Social health participation processes were analyzed based on the Theory of Communicative Action. This article considers public deliberation under a dialogic framework of providing and receiving reasons to justify opinions based on arguments. We support that argumentation is part of deliberation, since the quality of the former influences the quality of the latter. Two great contemporary currents of the Argumentation Theory are presented: Pragma-Dialectics and New Rhetoric. We argue that a combination of both approaches helps understand deliberation’s communicative determinants and consequently further understand the choices made in the process of creation and implementation of public health policies.
Social health control; Health policy; Public deliberation; Theory of communicative action; Argumentation theory