Agenda Setting

from Key Concepts in Public Relations

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Agenda setting remains one of the most influential and significant concepts in the study of public
relations, media and communication studies. The basic premise of agenda-setting theory is that the
way in which news media report particular issues influences and helps to shape public awareness
and debate about the subject (McCombs and Shaw, 1972). In a recent essay reviewing the
development of the concept across more than three decades, communications scholar Maxwell
McCombs claims that agenda setting has been the subject of 'hundreds of studies worldwide' (2005:
543). Moreover, as the news media have expanded to include Internet-based editions of
newspapers, email communication and online chat rooms, the potential for articulating diverse
agendas has grown markedly with research studies illustrating that 'agenda setting effects have been
documented for these new media' (2005: 543).

Beyond McCombs' central argument that 'those aspects of public affairs that are prominent in the
news become prominent among the public' (2005: 543), he suggests that media agendas are
constructed by a process of selection and prioritising which bestows a certain prominence for
particular issues guaranteeing them sustained coverage in news reports, while others are relatively
marginalised or ignored. The analogy with a committee agenda is close at hand – and obvious.
Committees rank agenda items to reflect their significance, with the least consequential matters
receiving only scant attention or not being discussed at all (Weaver et al., 1981; McCombs et al.,
1997). Consequently, agenda-setting theory has clear affinities with the theory of news framing (the
suggestion that people who lack direct knowledge of events become reliant on media for their
information, understanding and interpretation of those events, so that news media 'frame' reality for
their audiences and 'how people think about an issue … is dependent on how the issue is framed by
the media' [Semetko and Valkenburg, 2000: 94]). A similar affinity is evident with the theoretical
tradition of media effects (the highly contested claim that media messages have a direct and
significant effect on the knowledge, attitudes and even behaviour of members of the audience
[Barker and Petley, 1997: 1–12; Philo and Miller, 1999: 21]). However, in agenda setting, the
influence claimed for the media is less certain than in much theorising of media effects and rejects
any suggestion of propaganda. In a classic formulation of agenda setting, the suggestion is that
media do not tell us what to think, but they do tell us what to think about.

Agenda setting, however, does not posit a simple one-way model in which news media set the
priorities for public debate, but suggests that a number of contesting agendas vie for prominence. A
study of local press coverage of the 2005 general election in West Yorkshire, for example,
highlighted the dissonance between the news agendas of local journalists and party press officers
with the former concerned to report issues of local electoral salience (schools, hospitals, local traffic
schemes), while the latter promoted a national news agenda by organising visits by national
'celebrity' politicians (electoral 'horse race' concerns, Europe, taxation and spin concerning the Gulf
War) (Franklin et al., 2006: 260).

FURTHER READING
Franklin, B., Court, G. and Cushion, S. (2006) 'Downgrading the "local" in local reporting of the
2005 UK General Election', in Franklin, B. (ed.), Local Journalism, Local Media Making the

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 Local News. London: Routledge. pp. 256-70.
McCombs, M. (2005) 'A look at agenda setting: past, present and future', Journalism Studies,
6 (4): 543-58.
McCombs, M. and Shaw, D. (1972) 'The agenda setting function of mass media', Public
Opinion Quarterly, 36: 176-87.
Philo, G. and Miller, D. (1999) 'The Effective Media', in Philo, G. (ed.), Message Received.
London: Longman. pp. 21-33.
Semetko, H. and Valkenburg, P. (2000) 'Framing European Politics: content analysis of press
and television news', Journal of Communication, 50 (2): 93-109.

Bob Franklin

© Bob Franklin, Mike Hogan, Quentin Langley, Nick Mosdell and Elliot Pill 2009

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APA
Franklin, B. (2009). Agenda setting. In B. Franklin, M. Hogan, Q. Langley, & et. al., Key concepts in
public relations. Sage UK. Credo Reference: http://login.rproxy.uwimona.edu.jm/login?
url=https://search.credoreference.com/content/entry/sageukpr/agenda_setting/0?institutionId=8609

Chicago
Franklin, Bob. "Agenda Setting." In Key Concepts in Public Relations, by Bob Franklin, Mike Hogan,
Quentin Langley, and et. al.. Sage UK, 2009. http://login.rproxy.uwimona.edu.jm/login?
url=https://search.credoreference.com/content/entry/sageukpr/agenda_setting/0?institutionId=8609

Harvard
Franklin, B. (2009). Agenda setting. In B. Franklin, M. Hogan, Q. Langley & et. al., Key concepts in
public relations. [Online]. London: Sage UK. Available from: http://login.rproxy.uwimona.edu.jm/login?
url=https://search.credoreference.com/content/entry/sageukpr/agenda_setting/0?institutionId=8609
[Accessed 5 July 2021].

MLA
Franklin, Bob. "Agenda Setting." Key Concepts in Public Relations, Bob Franklin, et al., Sage UK, 1st
edition, 2009. Credo Reference, http://login.rproxy.uwimona.edu.jm/login?
url=https://search.credoreference.com/content/entry/sageukpr/agenda_setting/0?institutionId=8609.
Accessed 05 Jul. 2021.

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