The objective of this paper is to analyse the participation of current health councils in a city in the north-eastern of Brazil and its relationship with local political culture. The following theoretical presumption served as starting point: The practices adopted by health councils initiate a new institution that involves new social actors - the users - in the public sphere. The process of democratisation in the Brazilian society expands this sphere and leads to a confrontation of traditional and democratic political cultures. This is a qualitative research with the following data collection methods: documentary analysis, participant observation and semi-structured interviews. Within the evidence emerged, the dominance of traditional political culture resulted as one of the conditioning elements of participation practices in the Council, expressed in the authoritarianism and cooptation involving municipal managers and representatives of civil society. The majority of counsellors recognises the fragile power of the Council in terms of deliberative and fiscal issues. Despite confirming the frailties of the health councils, it is obvious that their importance in the democratisation of the relationship between State and civil society in the fight for the implementation of the right to health care.
Health council; Political participation; Political culture