The contribution of the social sciences, with theories and methods, has benn since the 1970's essential to the development and consolidation of the field known to health studies as collective health. Despite their major role, the social sciences have always occupied a lesser place in this field, which was dominated, since the 1970's and the 1980's, by health planning and, later, in the 1990's, by epidemiology. The preponderance of epidemiology occurred just when it was recognized by Capes (High-Level Personnel Perfectioning Coordination) as an autonomous field of study; a greater balance between different disciplines that are part of the collective health area was expected. This paper raises questions concerning the situation of the social sciences in this field, and in relation to the execution of incentives policy of national agencies such as Capes and CNPq (National Council for Scientific Research). The influence of a cost-benefit logic of predominantly economicist and quantitativist character, applied by the agencies in the concession of resources, interferes in the production as well as the circulation of knowledge, with severe losses for the social sciences. Surpassing this situation is one of the present challenges for social sciences and, in particular, to the collective health field.
Health field; social sciences and health; collective health periodicals; productivity and productivism in collective health; supporting agencies and collective health
