Who takes part in what?: experiences of shared construction in Brazil-Canada cooperation for the improving management in Primary Health Care

Abstract

The article examines processes and outcomes of the shared construction of knowledge and intervention in the Project for Improving Management of Primary Health Care (AGAP) developed cooperatively between Brazil and Canada. It involves four states in the Northeast region, uses the evaluation methodology with focus on achievements and learning and presupposes the cooperation and participation of stakeholders; the project, characterized as using multi methods, advocates triangulation through a combination of quantitative and qualitative approaches and techniques after identifying the moments in which sharing encounters happened, as well as the elements which hinder or facilitate this process and lessons learned. Evaluative research used the following methodology: document analysis; observation of meetings; workshop with the Evaluation Steering Committee for presentation and agreement of the proposal submitted; evaluation workshops on local projects, observation of health care services in the municipalities, semi-structured interviews with strategic interlocutors of local, regional, national and international levels. The results showed that the cooperation relationship between Brazil and Canada is promising, but needs to be built in a more cooperative and dialogical way, in which objects of cooperation are constructed in a shared form.