 Health governance challenges can make or break universal health coverage, UHC, reforms. One of the biggest health governance challenges is ensuring meaningful participation and adequately reflecting people's voices in health policies and implementation. Recognizing this, Iran's Health Transformation Plan, HTP, lays out the country's blueprint for UHC with an explicit emphasis on the socialization of health. Socialization is seen as a key means to contribute to HTP objectives, meaning the systematic and targeted engagement of the population, communities and civil society in health sector activities. Given its specific cultural and historical context, we sought to discern what notions such as civil society, non-governmental organization, etc. mean in practice in Iran with the aim of offering policy options for strengthening and institutionalizing public participation in health within the context of the HTP. For this, we reviewed the literature and analyzed primary qualitative data. We found that it may be more useful to understand Iranian civil society through its actions, defined by its motivation and activities rather than the prevailing international development understanding of civil society as a structure which is. This article was authored by Deepa Rajan, Muhammad Hadi Ayatsi, Mazir Morata Lake, and others. We are article.tv, links in the description below.