Agenda building

Cobb and Elder (1971) have presented the concept of agenda building examin-ing the process of createxamin-ing issues and reviewexamin-ing why certain issues succeed to gain the attention of decision makers, while others fail. For any policy change to be possible, the issue must first enter the policy agenda (Cobb & Elder 1971).

Carpenter (2007) studied issue emergence in transnational advocacy networks consisting of non-governmental organizations, international organizations, governments, and countless individuals in these spheres and bureaucracies, and found out, that effective advocacy in such networks is possible only if the issue enters the arena (Carpenter 2007, 101-102).

Usually, the number of potential public issues surpasses the decision-making institutions resources to process them and therefore different issues and their advocates must compete for a place on the decision-making agenda (Cobb et al. 1976, 126). Pre-decisional processes are in an important role in determin-ing which issues will be taken into consideration and how the issue achieves a position on the political agenda. Firstly, for the issue to gain agenda status, support from at least some key decision makers should be achieved, as they serve as gatekeepers of the formal agenda. (Cobb & Elder 1971, 903-905.)

Not all advocacy practitioners have the same resources to build an agenda.

Cobb and Elder (1971, 908) stress, that some groups have more power to do it than others and thus, those that have power can also prevent an issue from gaining agenda status. Identifying with specific groups, the group’s resources for mobilization as well as the strategic social or economic location in the struc-ture of the society are among factors affecting the level of priority given by de-cision makers. Also specific groups, such as church leaders or doctors, may en-joy greater public esteem in the society and therefore obtain an easier access to decision makers. (Cobb & Elder 1971, 908-909.)

In addition to political leaders, mass participation has a significant role in developing new agenda issues and also in redefining old ones. Media has a key role in translating issues into agenda items and therefore access to media re-mains important in this. (Cobb & Elder 1971, 905-912.) Hallahan (1999, 218) add, that framing has also an essential role in agenda building in the media, as advo-cacy practitioners attempt to communicate with either affected or sympathetic groups directly or indirectly via the media.

The mass media have the power to set the agenda and determine, which issues are perceived important by the public (McCombs & Shaw 1972). When influencing health-related policies, Bou-Karroum et al. (2017, 11) studied, that media interventions had a positive influence for instance by prioritizing and sparking policy discussions, raising policy makers awareness on the advocated health issues, influencing policy formulation as well as gaining support from the public, which again advances the policy change. Media interventions in pol-icy change spark not only positive outcomes, as they can unintendedly mobilize the issues opponents too. Thus, media actions that are carefully planned and take such situations into account, are helpful. (Bou-Karroum et al. 2017, 12.)

For SRHR issues, Oronje et al. (2011, 9) emphasize that using mass media to raise awareness and spread positive messages of the issues is beneficial. In sub-Saharan Africa, the reporting of SRHR issues is considered often as weak due to lack of interest and capacity in using evidence by journalists. To tackle this problem, the media should be engaged. Media engagement could be done by training and engaging journalists, building capacity to improve the nature of the coverage and establishing both formal and informal relationships with them (Oronje et al. 2011, 9.)

In a later study, Cobb et al. (1976) distinguished between two types of agendas the issues can get and succeed on; public agenda and formal agenda, as well as presented a model and propositions describing different ways issues get on these agendas. Issues that gain attention and are demanded to act upon by a significant portion of the public and of some governmental units in the percep-tion of community members, are the features of public agenda. Formal agenda issues receive serious attention from decision makers and are usually accepted for major consideration by policy makers. (Cobb et al. 1976, 126-127.) Issues of-ten shift between these agendas and get mobilized on either of these. In their study, Cobb et al. (1976) presented three conceptual models describing how

agenda building takes place and political agenda changes, explaining the trans-lation between public and formal agendas as well. (Cobb et al. 1976, 126-127.)

In outside initiative model of agenda building, pressure on decision mak-ers to advance the issue onto the formal agenda is conducted by groups outside the government. Simultaneously, the interest in the issue from other groups outside the government is aimed to be expanded, so that the issue would reach the public agenda as well. (Cobb et al. 1976, 132.) However, although the issue would reach the formal agenda status, it does not necessarily mean that the pol-icy change would end up to be exactly in line with what the groups wanted to achieve (Cobb et al. 1976, 132).

Secondly, the mobilization model focuses on issues that are initiated with-in the government and do not rise from the public agenda, although they still need support of the public for implementation. Issues instituted inside govern-ment reach the formal agenda status almost automatically, but successful im-plementation requires placement on public agenda as well. (Cobb et al. 1976, 135.) Final model, inside access model, attempts to exclude the participation of public from agenda building and policy formation. In this model, issues are dis-cussed within governmental units or in groups that have an easy access to poli-cy makers, and the public is not highly involved at any point. (Cobb et al. 1976, 135-136.)

Agenda building process includes four steps that occur in each conceptual model, which are categorized as initiation, specification, expansion and en-trance. In outside initiation model, initiation phase includes a simple “articula-tion of grievance” by a group located outside formal government structure.

Within the phase of specification, general grievances are translated into more specific demands by a specialized person or groups that may or may not be united. In expansion phase, the decision makers’ interest is drawn by expand-ing the issue to new groups and by connectexpand-ing the issue to already existexpand-ing ones.

This includes a possible risk of the initial group ending up losing control of the issue entirely, as more powerful groups enter the conflict making the original participants less important. These groups are identification group, attention group and within the mass public, attentive and general public. (Cobb et al.

1976, 128-129.)

The entrance phase includes issue expansion and placement on public agenda following it. At this stage, movement from public agenda to formal agenda is made and the issue can be taken into consideration by decision mak-ers. How the transition is made between the two agendas, varies largely across different political systems. (Cobb et al. 1976, 129-130.)

For mobilization model, initiation phase takes place when a new program or policy is announced by a major political leader putting the item automatical-ly on formal agenda and marking the end of formal decision-making phase in many political systems. Following the policy announcement, mobilization of the public happens in the next specification phase. This phase determines what is expected in terms of cooperation or support, material resources, work or behav-iour change. Implementation is mobilized in the expansion phase, and it

usual-ly depends on the public acceptance and changes in behaviour of the public. In entrance phase, the issue finally moves from formal to public agenda and thereby majority of the population recognizes the initiative as important. (Cobb et al. 1976, 132-134.)

Cobb et al. (1976) remind that the processes of agenda building are more complicated in practice, and they can combine and use features of the different models as well as the levels of the agendas and the issue may appear parallel on many agendas. Therefore, efforts to achieve the agenda status may be pointed at one of these agendas, some or both of them and the models may be used in many variations. (Cobb et al. 1976, 137.)