[The rings of snake: problem-based learning and the societies of control].

The imperative need for modifying the Brazilian medical education--aiming at the formation of a professional more capable to answer the populations main health problems--has opened the possibility for the use of new teaching methodologies. In this scenario, the Problem Based Learning (PBL) outstands as the curriculum structuring tool adopted in several institutions, showing as main characteristics the capability of fostering (1) significant learning, (2) the undissociated link between theory and practice, (3) the respect for the students autonomy, (4) the work in small groups, (5) the permanent education and (6) the formative evaluation. Despite its indisputable leading position, PBL can be understood as a way to exercise power in the context of an emerging modus of social organization: the societies of control.