Understanding The Term Of Agenda Setting Media Essay

Understanding The Term Of Agenda Setting Media EssayMaxwell McCombs and Donald Shaw first coined the term agenda-setting in their term The Agenda Setting playact of the Mass Media (McCombs and Shaw, 1972). stock-still the McCombs credits Walter Lippmann as the intellectual father of agenda setting (McCombs, 2004 3). Walter Lippmanns thesis Public Opinion1 depict the concept of a pseudo- surround an imagined reality of the world constructed from the media we consume. Lippmann suggested that man lives in a fictitious world, hence whatever we believe to be true picture, we treat as if it were the environment itself (Lippmann, 2007 7-10).Walter Lippmann dead reckoning that the Mass Media played an great role in the usuals understanding of the world they inhabited. The figure out that he implied suggested the atomic reactor media agenda played an consequential role in influencing/ constitution the world opinion or public agenda. Hansen writing 88 years later reaffirmed this rel ationship theorised by Lippmann, suggesting the media play a role in educating the publicWhile the roles of formal education in acquainting us with the public word and image vocabulary of the environment should non be overlooked, much, maybe most, of what we assure and know to the highest degree the environment we know from the media.Hansen utilises the Habermasian concept of a public sphere, suggesting that the mass media provide a public argonna for national and transnational conceive of environmental electric outletsSince the emergence and rise of the modern environmental military campaign in the 1960s, the mass media w atomic number 18 been a central public arena for publicising environmental issues and for contesting claims, arguments and opinions about our use and/or protection of the environment.(Hansen, 20106)The issues discussed within this public arena, can be described as the media agenda. However as much as the mass media provides a forum for discussion, it is n ot all inclusive. Environmental issues have to compete against each other for widespread reportage. As the environmental agenda, isnt unendingly at the forefront of the public agenda, a great deal multiple environmental issues are fighting for limited coverage from the charge upWhile many issues compete for public precaution, only a few are roaring in doing so, and bran-news media exert significant mildew on our perceptions of what are the most important issues of the day.(McCombs, 20042)McCombs, Lippmann and Hansen all suggest that the media dictate to round level, what are the most important issues of the day. The conundrum becomes how do the cultural gatekeepers decide which issue is the most important on the media agenda, and and so deserves media coverage? What influences the Media on environmental issues? To understand these questions it is necessary to address the fundamental obstacle for environmental issues to overcome to become newsworthy.Visual media utilises ima gery as a source of legitimacy. However as environmental problems develop over a long period of time they a great deal appear invisible a large proportion of the processes associated with the most nasty environmental problems tend to be inaccessible to the senses, invisible until they materialise as symptoms (Adam, 199812 Hansen, 2000 56). Hence although some environmental issues may be more austere in the long-term, they are not always deemed newsworthy as they have no iconography attached to their set.Pressure groups utilize the issue of in visibleness by creating eyeglasses and press stunts in order to make the invisible issues visible. Greenpeace in particular are hugely triple-crown at utilizing iconography2. Iconic images of icebergs, crashing into the sea or Fathers for arbiter scaling the Houses of Parliament can define an issue, and penetrate public consciousness, much easier than text based media. However Hansen argues that the effects of visual spectacles are bu nco term they only allow the issue to gain visibility as a trigger to create wider media interest for the issueThe newsworthiness of environmental imperativeness groups would soon wear off it had to hope solely on their creation of spectacular protest performancesthey are of course eminently newsworthy and visually striking, scarcely they are not sufficient for remaining on the media agenda or for celebrateing media visibility in the long term.(Hansen, 2010 53)Hansen argues that successful wedge groups are able to maintain visibility of the issue in the media by targeting issues that are already being discussed in the forums which the media regularly report on (i.e. Political forums, e.g. Parliament) (Hansen, 201053). This would suggest that the media agenda is presently and indirectly influenced by indemnity agenda, suggesting a symbiotic relationship as the media influence the public agenda, which in turn influences the form _or_ system of government agenda by equipment ca sualty of voting.James Dearing and Everett Rogers (Dearing and Rogers 1996, Rogers and Dearing 1988) visualised this concept see figure 1 suggesting that all three agendas are interlinked exposure through the mass media allows a social problem to be alter into a public issue (Dearing and Rogers, 19964). When some liaison becomes a public issue it is propelled into policy agenda through the government who represent the majoritys best interests. However the mass media rede on the policy agenda so pressure groups are able to exploit this cycle, by elevating topics they deem to be of most importance higher on the media agenda and in turn policy agenda via public pressure The agenda-setting process is an ongoing competition among the proponents of a set of issues to gain the attention of media professionals, the public, and policy elites (Dearing and Rogers, 19966).FigureHowever the relationship between the three agendas is not without its flaws For environmental issues to be addresse d by the press, they must propel themselves as the most important issue on the agenda to the media. However this does not correspond to levels of importance or seriousness to the publicThe relative prominence of a social issue is not in any way a simple reflection of levels of public concern it is heavily influenced by the activities of issue sponsors much(prenominal) as politicians, or successful interest or pressure groups(Anderson, 199730).The flavor that issues that appear in the media agenda are not necessarily the most important suggests other actors play a role in setting the agenda. So whilst we rely on the news to dictate what picture of the world we consume, the news agenda can be influenced by amongst other factors, celebrity endorsements. Dan Brockington (2008) suggests indus running society has only a fleeting interest in the environment their rare glimpse of the environment is often through highly romanticized representations of the environment quite a than their ow n experiences. Hence celebrity endorsements of environmentalism help to replace the lack of experience in society celebrity hurt for conservation fulfils a modern social need. The alienation from nature that characterizes capitalist urban living drives the demand for celebrity involvement in conservation (Brockington, 2008558).Criticisms of the agenda setting modelAgenda setting theory is based on long term effects. In order for an issue to become central in terms of public opinion, McCombs argued that the frequency or prominence of a given issue in the mass media, placed significant influence on how important the issues was perceived by the public Those issues emphasized in the news come to be regarded over time as important by the public (McCombs, 20044-5). However McCombs analysis of the prominence of a given issue doesnt take into consideration how the issue is framed within the mass mediaSocial movements have increasingly cerebrate on the media since it plays such an influent ial role in assigning importance to issues facing the public. But gaining attention alone is not what a social movement wants the real battle is over whose interpretation, whose framing of reality, gets the floor.(Ryan, 199153)Issues are at the mercy of the press, when they are pushed into the media forum. Different papers frame the issues within their ideological constraints. What becomes essential for claimsmakers and pressure groups, is the ability to manipulate the mass media, so the issue at hand remains at the focus within the different ideological representations.The numeric glide path also only looks how many times an article was published, not how many times the article was read. Obviously circulation figures are a rough guide that an article is being read by a high percentage of that readership. However this is no guarantee that the article is digested.This becomes a bigger problem when considering new mediums such as the internet, is that the quantity of articles on env ironmental issues is so vast that it would be inconceivable to assume that prominence related to prevalence to the public. Robert Burnett and P. David Marshall suggested that the problem readers have is filtering the vast amounts of information they have access to, to find the right news stories (Burnett and Marshall, 2003 153). Since hence digital news has grown significantly in popularity the problem thus becomes how can the media influence public opinion when the public have become their own filters, so can solely digest stories based on their interests rather than only being able to choose from a limited set of stories in a newspaper based on an editors choices.Another criticism of the quantitative analysis model favoured by McCombs is that it doesnt take into consideration how something gets adopted by the media. Anderson argued that agenda-setting theorists such as McCombs do not look at the initial triggers that cause issues to be included into the media agenda Agenda-settin g studies have tended to ignore the whole process through which social issues are taken up by the media (Anderson, 199725).Within Dearing and Rogers Model, the public are not deemed to be pivotal for the agenda setting process. However when considering the trigger that propels an issue into the media and policy forums (specifically on environmental issues) it can sometimes be attributed to a small group of public single(a)s who insight direct action, to spark wider interest. Brian Doherty et al. describe direct action asProtest action where protesters engage in forms of action designed not only or necessarily to change government policy or to shift the climate of public opinion through the media, but to change environmental actions around them directly.(Doherty, Paterson and Seel, 20001)The term public is contestable itself how do differentiate between ordinary members of environmental non-governmental organisations and members of a concerned club? Within different contexts we ca n all be described as the public. Protesters can be seen as belonging to the public, so the direct action that often provides the trigger for the uptake of issues into the media agenda could be described as coming from a small proportion of the public. The key component of agenda setting query should then be considered minority influence. The minority groups or opinion leaders disseminate their concerns on certain issues by influencing others by em bureauing their causes by form of protests, publicity stunts and media performances.Environmental Agenda SettingLooking specifically at the Kingsnorth Six case study and applying the Agenda Setting theory to it, we can expose the complexities twisting in the agenda setting process and how they may or may not be relevant when looking at it through the perspective of a non-governmental organisation, deciphering whether they are successful in utilising the media to fulfil their aims.The Kingsnorth Six direct action protest involved theDavi d Pepper claims that environmentalism is less a coherent movement and more of a turn in late-twentieth-century thought arguing that in its simplest definition an environmentalist is one who is concerned with the environment. Thus the majority of the West can be described as environmentalists (Pepper, 2000445-6). Whilst openly sharing oppositional views is widely acknowledged as a social taboo, the amount of active environmentalists are less popular. Hence by gathering attention to the Kingsnorth case, Greenpeace could turn a minority cause and propel it to the masses, thus gaining the issue serious political significance by bringing it to the environmental sympathisers domain as nobody wants to be seen as actively damaging the environment, for fear of commercial and political repercussions from the sympathizing majority.Hutchins and Lester argue that journalists have an environmentalist bias as it is in their readers interestJournalists acknowledge the saliency of environmental issu es to readers and audiences because of the threats posed to natural environments and peoples wellbeing by degradation and the unchecked activities of capital.(Hutchins and Lester, 2006434)Environmental issues have been of particular relevance since global warming was posed as a theory, ever since it has been at the forefront of media and science agenda, seeing with it the rise in popularity of political parties such as the Green Party in the United Kingdom yet also a rise in green policies. Environmental concerns transcend all classes so are useful for the media in targeting large concerned audiences. This scaremongering tactic validates the work of pressure groups and non-governmental organisations and disguises the profit motives of the media reporting it.However Hutchins and Lester ignore two key oppositional concepts the influence of corporations as advertisers and journalistic objectivity. The first point can be dismissed as only one corporation is being targeted the money los t from bark E.ON can be soft filled by other businesses from other sectors. The second point journalistic objectivity, allows a computer programme for debate, whereby environmental sceptics are allowed an correspond platform to discuss their opinions. This creates a dilemma similar to the religion versus science debate influential sceptics are allowed to pollute the influence of pressure groups with little understructure in scientific fact or common sense.The media is more than a site for environmental action it plays a significant role in shaping debate and influencing outcomes. It is here that representations are determined, images softened or distorted, and power granted or denied.(Hutchins and Lester, 2006 438)Hutchins and Lester bring up a fundamental point of the nature of the media in influencing outcomes of protests. Whereas the media validated Greenpeaces protests, specifically broadsheets such as The Guardian, projecting the Kingsnorth Six onto hero status even premie ring the Nick Broomfields short documentary A Time Comes The invention of the Kingsnorth Six (Broomfield, 2009). This presented the Kingsnorth Six as ordinary members of the public with no activist history, whom simply wanted to right a wrong. Dieter Rucht describes how in some rare instances the mass media can potentially be considered an ally for the social movements such as The Guardian in this case. However he warns that social movements would be wrong to rely on this as the mass media carry their own agenda different from the aims of the social movement (Rucht, 2004 55).The protest/publicity stunt clearly intended to insight media interest. Nick Broomfields short documentary (Broomfield, 2009) foregrounds the directness of Greenpeaces tactics to achieve press coverage. The activists assumptions of the media reaction were highlighted by a quote from Ben Stewart one of the Kingsnorth Six because my parents live go up there (Kingsnorth Power Station), I gave them a ring and sai d you might see on the news that I am on top of this power station (Stewart in Broomfield, 2009). This arrogance becomes justified when noting the introductory newsworthiness of Greenpeace protests in gaining media attention (Carroll and Hackett, 200687).Stewart then goes on to state Greenpeaces exact intentions, emphasizing the performance human face of the protest by having what is implied as press conferences on top of the chimney I got up and did the interviews with the media and tried to justify it (the protest) to the public when we were up there, and of cause this thing is always a bit controversial (Stewart in Broomfield, 2009). Then implying that it would disseminate the issue into public discourse/forums you get lots of public ringing into the palaver radio stations saying were nothing (Stewart in Broomfield, 2009). The whole direct action performance comes across as merely being a platform to receive media coverage to then disseminate their issue into the agenda. Howev er Greenpeaces performance tactics resonate well with the medias agenda as they provide the media with pre-packaged news storiesGreenpeace has always been inherently fascinating and newsworthy as far as the media are concerned. It presented them with totally pre-packaged, simplistic but very powerful images of confrontation that were very new and exciting(Gallie cited in Anderson, 199735)The Kingsnorth Six protest certainly did this providing photographs, videos and interviews to the various interested media. Allowing Greenpeace to remain in control of how their imagery was framed and represented.On an interview with ITV bloom Tonight Stewart justified their actions by highlighting Greenpeaces agenda on E.ONs proposed plans Gordon Brown wants to get a new one of those carbon dinosaurs and thats why were up here, were attempt to stop that happening (Stewart in Broomfield, 2009). The telephone interview from the top of the tower to new stations emphasises the link between performan ce and agenda setting. Whereas the protest may give the guise of trying to shut down the Kingsnorth plant in order to stop the polluting power station, the primary objective of the press stunt prevails securing communication with the media, thus allowing Greenpeace to dictate the news agenda.However their story only reached local anesthetic level on television news coverage, receiving coverage from ITV Meridian Tonight and BBC atomic number 34 Today. Contrary to the regionalised coverage of the initial protest the concomitant trial received national attention on the respective channels. This would imply that the Kingsnorth Six protest functioned as a trigger to greater media coverage rather than gaining the substantial media coverage needed for an issue to become adopted into the national media and public agenda. It would be booming to assume that Greenpeace had expected more coverage than they received initially.However the issue was already in the political forum, with the Gov ernmental body The Department for Business, Enterprise and restrictive Reform due to release a white paper on the carbon capture and storage regulations. This reflects Hansens sentiments (mentioned earlier), suggesting it is a deliberate tactic to target issues already in political forums (Hansen, 201053). Critiques of Greenpeace reaffirm Hansens observations. Chris Ross writing for Greenpeace highlighted some of myths surrounding the Brent spar case study that Greenpeace had the potential to act on issues that they themselves stood to gain positive(p) framing, in other words easy battlesGreenpeace had given little though to the issue it was going to tackle, or its consequences. In short, the Brent Spar was a ingenuous photo opportunity for an organisation faced (in some countries) with a decline of its membership and visibility.(Ross, 199840)This could be said of the Kingsnorth Case, Greenpeace knew that the proposed plans were controversial within the economical and political climate, so had predicted an easy win which would create a good photo opportunity. This is not to say that Greenpeace was not interested in the issue beforehand, but simply chose a strategic target out of the many environmental criminals in the world.Greenpeace should not be solely attributed with pushing the Kingsnorth case into the media, public and policy agenda after all other non-governmental organisations were also active such as Climate Camp and Friends of the Earth. This poses the dilemma did Greenpeace activate this protest network by projecting the struggle into the agenda? However it is evident from the polaric media representation of the protests that the Greenpeace protest yielded a greater media influence (than the Climate Camp protests) due to its previous validation within the media because of previous successes in gaining media attention (Carroll and Hackett, 200687). Whereas Climate Camp was undermined by their history of prejudicial encounters with the police.The Kingsnorth Six Coverage/ AnalysisOn October 8th 2007 six Greenpeace representatives climbed the 200 mebibyte high hatful at the Kingsnorth power station in Medway, Kent, attempting to paint the words Gordon bin it on it. Whilst another 20 activists chained themselves to the stations transporter belt, immobilising it from burning coal. The Kingsnorth Six as the media labelled them (see fig.2 ), successfully managed to draw significant media attention from October 2007 till September 2008 when the activists were acquitted of the charges of causing 30,000 of criminal damage to the smokestack on the defence that they were acting to prevent climate change, a landmark case in legal history3.Figure 5 members of the Kingsnorth 6 Greenpeace activists.Greenpeace aspired to highlight the plans of the government and the German energy corporation E.ONs proposed plans to build a new coal powered power station at Kingsnorth which was proposed to be operational by 2012 the first of its kind in Britain since 1986. Greenpeace claimed itself that the ensuing direct action led to the postponement of E.ONs plans. Much like the Brent Spar case in 1995, as Hansen described Greenpeace succeeded in stiring up sufficient media, political and public interest (Hansen, 200057) to force E.ON to reconsider its position. The question is how much responsibility can Greenpeace claim? Did the subsequent media coverage really have the effect that Greenpeace claimed?Hansen (Hansen, 2010) repeatedly coins the term claims-maker in reference to pressure groups suggesting that groups such as Greenpeace take a conservative survival in their choice of issues to propel into the spotlight. He suggests that claims-makers choose topics which are already involved in policy agenda or LegislatorMost of the issues on which successful pressure groups campaign and successfully gain media coverage are issues which already have an institutional forum rather than completely new issues which have not been prob lematised in some form or other before.(Hansen, 201053)This would suggest that Policy Agenda influences the pressure groups choice in agenda as they are more likely to have success in influencing the three agenda setting processes if they are able to frame and elaborate existing issues that are already in the public domain (Hansen, 201054).Hansen suggests that Greenpeaces spectacular protest performances are great at creating a visual spectacle however they are not sufficient at maintaining media visibility in the long term (Hansen, 201053). In other words apart from the newsworthiness of the Kingsnorth-Six stunt, the more important factor in agenda setting, was the subsequent trial that kept the Kingsnorth issue visible.Hansen suggests that it is not as simple as just setting the agenda as McCombs suggested, the quantity is not of coverage is irrelevant if the coverage is framed in the wrong wayWhile an environmental pressure group such as Greenpeace has the ability to secure media coverage for its claims its capacity to influence or control the way its claims are framed and inflected by individual newspapers is more questionable.(Hansen, 200071)Hansen looked at a selection of the three traditional types of newspapers from the British press Daily Mail, Daily Telegraph and Daily Mirror and their respective Sunday editions (Hansen, 2000 58). Analysing each newspapers output over the period following the Brent Spar protests to determine how the coverage was framed looking specifically at the gulf between commanding attention for an issue and securing legitimacy (Hansen, 200056). He found that individual media exert ideological work upon their differential accessing of sources and their differential choice and promotion of particular lexical terms (e.g. Greenpeace as terrorists, a nuisance, undemocratic) (Hansen, 2010 57). Hansen implied that Greenpeace media coverage was at the mercy and scrutiny of each outlets ideological allegiance.Although the initial protes t is the most visible in terms of photos and iconic moments, in its initial aftermath the majority of press coverage was localised. A search of the Nexis newspaper database shows none of the national newspapers covered the protest in the week following the incident, with the majority of coverage remaing on local television broadcasts and regional newspapers.Between October 15th 2007 and September 10th 2008 there were 42 articles containing the keywords Kingsnorth and Greenpeace. Of these 19 were from The Guardian and The Observer and 10 were from The Independent (both of which could be described as having an environmental bias), hence only 13 were from other UK national newspapers. Applying McCombs quantitative methodology of agenda setting stating that the most prominent public issues are synonymous with the most important public issues (McCombs, 20045) One could conclude that Greenpeaces publicity stunt had failed to garner notable national coverage of the Kingsnorth plight compar ed to its previous successes of gaining the presss attention (e.g. Brent Spa).However out of the mediocre coverage 76% was from UK national newspapers with a history of environmental concern echoing once again Ruchts notion that the media can potential act as an ally for social movements (Rucht, 200455).The Observer notably, exclusively broadcasted Nick Broomfields documentary, which utilised, among others David Gilmour on the soundtrack.Whereas there was a total of 21 national newspaper articles covering the Kingsnorth-Six trial finding of fact between the 11th and 15th of September 2008 suggesting the mainstream coverage was more interested in the verdict of the court on the Kingsnorth Six as the result could set a precedent for future environmental policy agenda. Therefore in this case the Kingsnorth-Six stunt was more successful in becoming part of the media agenda in its aftermath.In Hansens Claims-Making in the Brent Star Controversy (2000) He suggests that the Telegraph util ised a cast out overlexicalisation of descriptors to describe Greenpeaces actions (Hansen, 200062). Throughout the Kingsnorth coverage The Daily Mail, The Mirror and The Express conformed to this convention, often sensationalising the news with doom-mongering extrapolations.The Daily Mail framed the verdict of the case with a negative sensationalist set of descriptors, being highly critical of the ramifications that the case may have for the future of civil order. Whilst being highly critical of Greenpeaces actions the focus was shifted from the agenda of climate change, towards the unlawful nature by which the activists disseminated their message framing the Greenpeace activists as potential threatening to the public Green Light to Anarchy Greenpeace Verdict forget Encourage Lawbreakers, Warns Widdecombe (Sears, 200812). Hansen observed a similar instance/tactic in the Brent Spar case whilst analysing the framing of civil protest suggesting that The article served a functionlinki ng together and interpreting a series of vaguely related events or activities as symptoms of a deeper problem or social malaise (Hansen, 200061)Emily Highmore What Greenpeace did was hugely unreliable (Cited in Sears, 200812)So is it OK Now to Kill Gary Glitter? (Littlejohn, 200817).So next time some self righteous vegan in cycling goldbrick is caught smashing up a Range Rover in the name of the polar bears, dont be surprised when they try to use this not guilty verdict as their Get Out Of Jail Free card (Littlejohn, 200817).The MirrorNOT LAWFUL.. JUST AWFUL. (Routledge, 200829)This is judicial lunacy. It opens the way to all sorts of violence by flat-Earth nutters crumpled on halting the construction of vital new generating capacity. (Routledge, 200829)The ExpressJudge is an Ass for this Ruling. (Hamilton, 200831).The judges direction clearly encourages politically motivated acts of mayhem and is a threat to public order (Hamilton, 200831).In all of the above examples the verdic t is framed as being giving anarchic powers to Green protesters, sensationalising the potential ramifications. The Greenpeace activists are seen as the Villains disturbing the peace and creating disharmony in the legal system. The Judge and Jury are thus portrayed as the Anti-Heroes being too easily swayed by the glamour of the environmental celebrities paraded by Greenpeace in defence.The IndependentFor the jury that acquitted the six activists may have done more to frustrate the Governments plans to build coal-fired powered stations than the pressure group has achieved in years. (Lean, 200854)The People are Ahead of the Game on Climate Change. (Lean, 200854)The Daily Telegraphsevere confusion to the Government (Clover, 200833).So the Greens are Right About Coal (Clover, 200833).The GuardianClimb Every Chimney . . . The Kingsnorth Six Admitted Causing 30,000 Worth of violate to a Coal-Fired Power Station Yet a Jury Still Refused to Find Them Guilty. The Verdict Has Left the Gove rnments Energy Plans in the Balance, Says John Vidal, and Given a Huge Boost to Climate Change Protesters. (Vidal, 20084).The Maidstone verdict has changed all that and could prove a turning point both for the protest movement and industrial policy (Vidal, 20084).If I was E.ON or Owned an Airport, Id be Very, Very Worried Activists from Other Groups Hail the Kingsnorth Victory. (Van Der Zee, 20087)Mel Evans a Climate Camp activist When you take the arguments to a jury, then they respond in this way because they can see what the reality is. (cited in Van Der Zee, 20087)Goldsmith accused the government of a profound lack of humor when it came to examining alternative energy solutions (Henley, 2008 6)Beyond all Reasonable Doubt How Four Witnesses Put the Government in the Dock. (Henley, 2008 6)The above examples utilise the David versus Goliath analogy or as Vladimir Propp would suggest the Hero character type, suggesting that the case stood as a shift in the