Samenvatting PPG hoorcollege 7 t/m 12
Webcollege 7 PPG
Agenda setting
What is agenda setting?
Definitions agenda setting:
‘Put simply, this stage is about getting an issue on the agenda.’
o K&T
o Very minimal definition
‘… the process by which problems and alternative solutions gain or lose public and
elite attention.’
o Birkland
What is an agenda?
‘An agenda is a collection of problems, understandings of causes, symbols, solutions, and
other elements of public problems that come to the attention of members of the public and
their government officials.’
- Birkland
Problems: issues that are articulated in the public sphere CORE ELEMENT
Causes: what causes the problem?
Solutions: what kind of solutions can we come up with to deal with the problem?
Symbols: how can we symbolically communicate that solution to people? What kind
of metaphors can we use to clarify it?
Governmental and non-governmental actors are involved in this definition.
Four types of agenda’s
Agenda universe
o All matters that are in the public debate and that are possibly up for discussion.
They are not currently part of debate in the political system. They require
government attention.
o For instance: the issues about racism (BLM)
Systemic agenda
o Issues that already taken into consideration. They have been brought to the
attention of politicians. Problems worthy of public attention.
o Systemic agendas are on all levels (national, regional, etc.)
Institutional agenda
o Issues that are already in the political arena. Politicians are considering how to
deal with the problem.
o They decide how much money they want to spend on the problem, how much
time they want to spend on it and which and how many resources they want to
use to solve the problem.
Decision agenda
, o Problems that will be acted upon. Problems that have been decided by the
cabinet/president/congress/parliament. Problems where the government will
act. This often contains of law making processes.
o This also happens on different levels of government.
Example of how this works:
Getting domestic violence on the agenda in Spain
Themis: female judges and lawyers.
There was a woman in Spain who was abused by her husband and she went public about this
and it got a lot of media attention. Then two weeks after she was murdered by her husband. At
that point the media exploded. Many people went to the streets. At the same time there was an
independence struggle about Basque country wanted to be separate from Spain. This was
getting a lot of attention because they were quite violate and they even assassinated people.
Feminist organizations did a research about domestic violence and they discovered
that domestic violence has more victims than the independence struggle.
You say to the public: this is a huge problem and we have to act on this.
This was basically forcing the conservative party in Spain to make policy about this
problem.
So the matter moved from the systemic agenda towards the institutional agenda
However there was great polarization about the problem; people didn’t agree about what to do
about the problem. In the 2000 elections the winning party had promised that they would act
up on the problem but they didn’t.
So all this time the problem stayed on the institutional agenda. In 2004 there came a law
about it so it finally reached the decision agenda.
Vox calls feminists feminazi’s and they try to get rid of the domestic violence policy.
They want to push the problem out of the decision agenda and back to the institutional
or even the systemic agenda.
Getting on the right agenda
Moving up the agenda is competition between potential public interests. And
sometimes party’s like Vox try to get something of the agenda.
The higher you get, the more competition between interest groups, NGO’s, SMOs, etc.
Core executive system (like the Netherland: decided every 4 years with governing
coalitions): there is only a small time window right after the elections.
Federal system (such as US; which are more decentralized and where you can lobby
with the president, the Senate and the house of representatives): more opportunities;
also there are always elections in the US.
The how and why of agenda-setting
The how of agenda-setting
Outside initiative model:
o Bottom up: this model claims that agenda-setting happens through bottom up
influence: NGO’s, SMOs (social movement organizations).
o It comes from society and it goes to the government.
, o Example: environmental movement 1970s. Social movements about the
environment noticed early on that there was going to be a big climate change
and that people and the state should care about sustainability. Groups like these
made this known amongst the public.
Mobilization model:
o Top down: politicians move a topic from the systemic to the institutional
agenda. They also seek support for the topic.
o This happens when a topic is not very well known by the public, but more by
the experts.
o Example: aids. When aids came up, a lot of people didn’t know what this
decease meant. Quite some people died from it and then scientists learned that
it came from sexual intercourse and that a lot op gay people had it. Politicians
addressed this as a public issue and started to make the public aware of this.
And so it was brought up in the systemic agenda and after that in the
institutional agenda.
Inside access model:
o Top down: they focus on certain stakeholders. They want to limit the number
of groups involved in the issue.
o Example: accountability hospitals. When hospitals get privatized, you still
want hospitals to be accountable because they are working on public health
issues. You need policy about this. You don’t want to get the public too much
involved in this and you only want to discuss this with politicians, healthcare
organizations (insurance companies), medical specialists, nurses, labor unions,
etc.
Three dimensions (faces) of power
Dahl:
o A has power over B to the extent that she or he can have B do something that
B would not otherwise do.
o This happens through resources: money, how much time you have, your place
in society (are you part of the elite or not), etc.
Barach & Baratz:
o A creates or reinforces social and political values and institutional practices
that limit the scope for B to raise issues that would be detrimental to A’s
preferences.
o Keeping issues of the agenda.
Lukes:
o A also has power over B by influencing, shaping and determining his or her
desires through control over information, mass media and socialization
processes.
The why of agenda-setting
K&T: three perspectives:
Power distribution perspective (on agenda-setting):
o First dimension: who has enough resources to put pressure on the government?
Pressure on the government through lobbying (costs a lot of money), protest
