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NGOs’ humanitarian advocacy in the 2015 refugee crisis:

A study of agenda building in the digital age

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ABSXXX10.1177/0002764218759578American Behavioral ScientistYang and Saffer

Article
American Behavioral Scientist
2018, Vol. 62(4) 421­–439
NGOs’ Advocacy in the © 2018 SAGE Publications
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DOI: 10.1177/0002764218759578
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Digital Age

Aimei Yang1 and Adam Saffer2

Abstract
In the 2015 European refugee crisis, nonprofit and nongovernmental organizations
(NGOs) offered help and actively advocated for millions of refugees. The current
study aims to understand what communication strategies are most effective for
NGOs to influence media coverage and the public’s social media conversations about
refugees. We found that agenda building on traditional media and in social media
conversations require different strategies. Specifically, although providing information
subsidies could powerfully influence traditional media coverage, its effect waned in
the context of social media conversations. In contrast, NGOs’ hyperlink network
positions emerged as the one of the influential factors for NGOs’ prominence in social
media conversations. Moreover, stakeholder-initiated engagement could influence
agenda building both in traditional media coverage and social media conversations.
Finally, organizational resources and characteristics are important factors as well.
Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Keywords
refugee crisis, agenda building, networks, engagement

Since 2010, European countries have seen a steady increase of asylum applications
and illegal border crossings by refugees. In 2013, fewer than 60,000 refugees reached
Europe, while in 2014 some 219,000 refugees arrived (United Nations High
Commission for Refugees, 2015). The number reached a historical high in 2014 and

1University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA

2University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC, USA

Corresponding Author:
Aimei Yang, Annenberg School of Communication and Journalism, University of Southern California,
Los Angeles, CA, USA.
Email: aimei.yang@usc.edu
422 American Behavioral Scientist 62(4)

eventually escalated into a major humanitarian crisis the following year. By 2015, an
estimated one million refugees entered the European Union to seek asylum (Frontex,
2016). The influx of refugees overwhelmed many European governments and trig-
gered the most severe international refugee crisis since World War II.
The public’s understanding of the refugee crisis has been marred by multiple story-
lines. On the one hand, the crisis has claimed thousands of refugees’ lives. On the
other, crisis has become associated horrendous incidents such as the 2016 New Year’s
Eve violent attack on women in Cologne, Germany; March 13, 2016, bomb attack in
Ankara, Turkey; and the March 22, 2016, terrorist attack in Brussels, Belgium. Populist
groups have used these attacks and the refugee crisis to weaken the European Union’s
legitimacy and inflame tensions against refugees.
Recognizing the magnitude of this international crisis, many nongovernmental and
nonprofit organizations (NGOs hereafter) assisted with refugee resettlement and have
actively advocated on behalf of refugees. For example, the International Rescue
Committee (2016) has provided support to Syrian refugees in Syria, Jordan, Lebanon,
Iraq, Turkey, Greece, and Serbia. Doctors Without Borders established hospitals in
refugee camps to provide medical, psychological, and nutritional care. Many NGOs
have also organized demonstrations, released news releases and digital media updates
to inform the public, and advocated for the humane treatment of refugees. Yet in the
crowded networked public sphere, as so many social actors, interest groups, and politi-
cians take part in the debates, it is uncertain how NGOs’ voices can be heard.
For many NGOs, their success hinges on their ability to mobilize resources, rally
international allies to help refugees, and build an agenda for the public discourse about
the refugee crisis. The current study identifies effective communication strategies that
NGOs use to influence media coverage and social media conversations about the refu-
gee crisis, and offers practical suggestions to advance NGOs’ communication prac-
tices. We use the classic theory of agenda setting and public relations research on
agenda-building theory to guide our inquiry (Guo & Vargo, 2015; McCombs, 2013).
However, agenda-setting and agenda-building theories primarily focus on the effect of
information transmission. We argue, in the context of networked digital media, it is
necessary to also consider the network structures that allow organizations to effec-
tively disseminate their messages.
We assert that NGOs’ network positions and engagement on social media can
influence NGOs’ abilities to have their messages heard in the networked public
sphere—the digital space where politicians, journalists, organizations, groups, and
citizens publicly negotiate issues. NGOs build relationships and form alliances with
other civil actors to pool resources and magnify their collective voices. Their rela-
tionship building efforts can determine NGOs’ positions in offline and online net-
works, which may further influence their abilities to garner media coverage and the
public’s attention. Furthermore, we recognize that NGOs’ engagement on social
media platforms may bolster NGOs’ agenda-building effectiveness and influence
social media conversations.
In the following sections, we review recent agenda setting and agenda-building
research to identify valuable insights and gaps in the literature. We further discuss the
Yang and Saffer 423

potential impact of a range of communication and network building strategies.

Additionally, the study utilizes multiple research methods and analytic techniques
including data-mining and social network analysis to assess our hypotheses. The find-
ings provide unique insights to advance agenda-building theory and provide guide-
lines to advance NGOs’ communication practice in the refugee crisis.

Agenda Building: An Organizational Perspective on

Agenda Setting
Agenda setting theory proposes that the media influence public opinion by highlighting
certain issues over others. Issues that receive extensive media coverage tend to be per-
ceived by the public as more important (McCombs & Shaw, 1972). Agenda setting
represents an important stream in media effects research and has guided a range of
communication subfields such as public relations (Kiousis, Popescu, & Mitrook, 2007).
Whereas agenda setting primarily focuses on the transfer of object and attribute
salience from the media to the public, other scholars have sought to reveal the anteced-
ents of agenda setting. Such scholars have explored “who, or what, sets the media’s
agenda” (Turk & Franklin, 1987, p. 29). Among different approaches, public relations
scholars have typically examined organizational factors such as one organization’s
strategic communication practices that build the media’s agenda.

Agenda-Building Research in Public Relations

Agenda-building theory, the public relations extension of agenda setting theory,
explores the nuances of organizations’ strategic communication efforts to build the
media’s agenda. Curtin (1999) explained that agenda building happens when “practi-
tioners can obtain media placement of their [information] subsidies, then they influ-
ence the media’s agenda, which in turn can influence public opinion and the public
agenda” (p. 54). Notably, such definition narrowly focuses on practitioners’ media
relations activities. Carroll and McCombs (2003) expanded the definition beyond
media relations when they stated that agenda building is “the aggregate of discourse
by a firm including attempts through public relations strategies to influence the media
with a variety of information subsidies” (p. 42). Along this line, Kim and Kiousis
(2012) explained, “agenda building refers to the salience of the issues that the organi-
zation is communicating about (or the organization itself), while the attribute level
refers to the salience of attributes that the organization emphasizes regarding the issue
(or the organization)” (p. 658). In total, scholars recognize that a range of public rela-
tions strategies shape the media’s agenda; yet the connection between organizations’
relationship-building and agenda-building activities have not been not been studied.
Agenda building has a clear organizational orientation and focuses on what organi-
zations can do to influence media coverage about them or their issues of interests.
Agenda-building research has looked at how various types of organizations purpo-
sively utilize public relations to build an agenda. For example, Kiousis et al. (2016)
found that a variety of information subsidies like news releases and speeches influence
424 American Behavioral Scientist 62(4)

the media’s agenda and policy making. Overall, most agenda-building studies have
been situated in the context of political public relations (Kiousis et al., 2007; Kiousis,
Mitrook, Wu, & Seltzer, 2006), while others have situated their studies in corporate
communications (Ragas, 2013). To our best knowledge, few studies have looked at
how civil actors such as NGOs seek to build the media’s agenda.
Nevertheless, NGOs are important strategic communicators. Many NGOs work on
controversial issues that need to draw broad public attention for solution (e.g., climate
change, income inequality, etc.). NGOs’ ability to build the media’s agenda and claim
ownership of issues often shapes their chance of accomplishing real social change. As
Bernard Kouchner, founder of Doctors Without Bounders famously stated during the
Biafra crisis: “where there is no camera, there is no humanitarian intervention” (Cate,
2002, p. 5). Being in the spotlight helps NGOs raise funds, recruit volunteers/mem-
bers, and gain access to different types of capital. NGOs that have stayed in the spot-
light extensively tend to emerge as leaders in their issue(s) area(s) (e.g., Amnesty
International, Doctors Without Bounders, etc.) and their agenda has a better chance of
influencing public discourse. The need for NGOs to build agenda is especially urgent
for the refugee crisis due to the need for cross-sectoral and transnational cooperation
to deliver tangible solutions.

NGOs’ Agenda-Building Strategies

Our review of the literature identified four factors that may contribute to NGOs’ abili-
ties to build the media’s and the public’s agendas. First, agenda-building research sug-
gests that NGOs’ information subsidies influence their prominence in the media
coverage. Second, organizational network research indicates that NGOs’ positions in
online and offline networks can determine which NGOs can emerge as prominent
information sources for the media (Malinick, Tindall, & Diani, 2013; Shumate & Lipp,
2008). Third, a line of recent research suggests engagement on social media may help
NGOs increase their influence on the public’s social media conversations (Chen & Fu,
2016; Himelboim, Golan, Moon, & Suto, 2014). Finally, we consider organizational
characteristics that may influence NGOs’ agenda-building capacities.

Information Subsidies
Public relations scholars have long examined whether information subsidies influ-
ences the salience of objects in media coverage and in turn affect public perceptions.
To date, researchers have examined information subsidies like news releases (Kiousis
et al., 2006) and video news releases (Harmon & White, 2001), and through different
media such as websites, blogs, and social media (Kiousis et al., 2015). Research has
consistently found that information subsidies have varying levels of impact on organi-
zations’ agenda-building efforts. For example, Kiousis, Kim, Carnifax, and Kochhar
(2014) reported that “news releases, Facebook posts, speeches, and Twitter messages
show the most consistent linkage with news coverage” (p. 616). Drawing from exten-
sive research on information subsidies, we assert that NGOs’ different types of
Yang and Saffer 425

information subsidies will influence their prominence in the media coverage and social
media conversations about the refugee crisis.

Hypothesis 1a: An NGO’s (traditional and digital) information subsidies will

influence the NGO’s prominence in the media coverage about the refugee issue.
Hypothesis 1b: An NGO’s (traditional and digital) information subsidies will
influence the NGO’s prominence in social media conversations about the refugee
issue.

Besides providing information subsidies, NGOs also engage in a range of relation-

ship building activities with stakeholders. In a networked public sphere, connecting
with various types of social actors can allow some NGOs to emerge as influential
information sources for the media and the public.

Virtual and Real-World Network Positions

Contemporary public relations activities encompass much more than media relations
and information subsidies. Although public relations scholars have examined how
information subsidies can influence the media’s agenda, few studies have incorporated
the potential impact of relationships and networks on agenda building. Conceptually,
coupling agenda-building and relationship theories is not new. Kiousis et al. (2006)
asserted that agenda building could buttress relationship theory to “better understand
the process by which public relations shifts from influencing opinions to working to
build and maintain relationships as a function of a communication effort” (p. 279). We
build from this postulation to consider the impact of social networks on public rela-
tions outcomes. Additionally, we use findings from social movement research that
suggest network positions influence actors’ prominence in the media coverage
(Malinick et al., 2013).
In the current study, we consider the potential effect of two types of networks:
NGOs’ offline and online network positions. In terms of offline networks, network
theories assume that actors positioned centrally in a network possess greater influ-
ence, authority, and status. Network theorists argue that actors’ central network posi-
tions grant them control over the flow of information (Borgatti, Everett, & Johnson,
2013). As Freeman (1978) explained, “With respect to communication, a point
[actor] with relatively high degree [centrality] is somehow ‘in the thick of things’”
(p. 219). Similarly, Malinick et al. (2013) found that environmental activists’ cen-
trality (the extent to which an actor is well connected in a network) affected their
prominence in media coverage. Informed by these studies, we propose the following
hypotheses:

Hypothesis 2a: NGOs’ offline network centralities will influence NGOs’ promi-
nence in the media coverage about the refugee issue.
Hypothesis 2b: NGOs’ offline network centralities will influence NGOs’ promi-
nence in the social media conversations about the refugee issue.
426 American Behavioral Scientist 62(4)

Along with NGOs’ offline network positions, NGOs’ positions in hyperlink net-
works can also influence their ability to build agenda. In the virtual space, central
websites or those with a heavy traffic often attract most of the attention in a network.
Because online texts tend to be governed by power law distribution, a selection of a
few websites often receive the lion’s share of inbound hyperlinks, while the majority
of websites receive few or none (Barabási, 2003).
Previous studies found that hyperlink networks can set the boundary of issues and
define the framework of reference. Young and Leonardi (2012) suggest that the public
or decision makers who are unfamiliar with an issue often need to search the web to see
what organizations are knowledgeable to provide information about the social issue. In
the navigation process, individuals often reflexively monitor the associations among
organizations. They argue that hyperlink networks bring perceivable structure to social
issues, and help publics identify certain websites as credible information sources. Given
the potential values of NGOs’ hyperlink network positions, we thus hypothesize:

Hypothesis 3a: NGOs’ hyperlink network centralities will influence NGOs’ promi-
nence in the media coverage about the refugee issue.
Hypothesis 3b: NGOs’ hyperlink network centralities will influence NGOs’ prom-
inence in the social media conversations about the refugee issue.

Aside from connecting to other websites, NGOs may build agenda through social
media engagement.

Digital Engagement Among Organizations and Stakeholders

Research has documented how information disseminates through social media and
affects the mass media agenda and public discourse (Ragas & Kiousis, 2010). Yet merely
having a social media account is insufficient for NGOs to be heard in the crowded net-
worked public sphere. Studies suggest engagement is key to boosting organizations’
social media presence and influence (Himelboim et al., 2014). Engagement is not solely
an organizational activity and its success depends on organizations and stakeholders.
Digital engagement is conceptualized as the experiences of organizations and
stakeholders interacting or exchanging messages (Saxton & Waters, 2014). Engagement
on social media can range from passive activities like following and reading tweets to
more active activities like responding and having conversations on Twitter. Importantly,
a proper understanding of engagement must consider who (organization vs. stakehold-
ers) initiates engagement. In this study, we operationalize engagement as NGOs and
stakeholders interacting with one another on social media, and measure the engage-
ment from NGOs and from stakeholders, respectively.
Organization-initiated engagement is “the interaction between an organization and
those individuals and groups that are impacted by, or influence, the organization”
(Bruce & Shelley, 2010, p. 30). Organization-initiated engagement originates from an
organization and is directed toward stakeholders who are fans or followers on social
media platforms. Organizations can engage specific followers directly by replying to
Yang and Saffer 427

their tweets, mentioning certain stakeholders in tweets, or retweeting stakeholders’

tweets. Studies have found that organization-initiated engagement contributes to rela-
tional and behavioral outcomes that increases the likelihood for stakeholders to engage
in public advocacy on behalf of organizations. Based on this literature, we believe
organization-initiated engagement will influence NGOs’ agenda-building capacity by
increasing stakeholders’ and the media’s awareness about the refugee issue.

Hypothesis 4a: NGOs’ digital organization-initiated engagement will influence

NGOs’ prominence in the media coverage about the refugee issue.
Hypothesis 4b: NGOs’ digital organization-initiated engagement influences
NGOs’ prominence in the social media conversations about the refugee issue.

Stakeholder-initiated engagement, on the other hand, is primarily concerned with

the stakeholders “who voluntarily interact with an organization” in ways that can be
beneficial for organizations (Luoma-aho, 2015, p. 7). Stakeholder-initiated engage-
ment such as recommendations from stakeholders increases organization–
stakeholder trust and loyalty. Studies have found that engaged stakeholders are
more likely to participate in ongoing conversations with organizations and other
stakeholders, and retweet or repost organizations’ messages in their own social net-
works (Chen & Fu, 2016). Given the potential effect of stakeholder-initiated engage-
ment, we hypothesize:

Hypothesis 5a: Stakeholder-initiated engagement affects NGOs’ prominence in

the media coverage about the refugee issue.
Hypothesis 5b: Stakeholder-initiated engagement affects NGOs’ prominence in
the social media conversations about the refugee issue.

Other Organizational Characteristics

Journalists and the public often turn to the most legitimate sources for information.
Previous research suggests that a number of organizational characteristics may influ-
ence NGOs’ status in a network or in the media coverage about an issue. Specifically,
research suggests that NGOs with a long tenure are more likely to be viewed as legiti-
mate sources of information (Chen & Fu, 2016). Moreover, Shumate and Lipp (2008)
found that generalist NGOs (NGOs with heterogeneous goals) tend to emerge as more
legitimate voices of NGOs’ coalitions than specialist NGOs (NGOs with narrowly
defined goals). Finally, NGOs with more abundant resources may utilize more public
relations strategies and tactics and consequentially enjoy a greater influence on media
coverage. Informed by these previous studies, we posit that organizational character-
istics influence NGOs’ agenda-building capacity.

Hypothesis 6a: NGOs’ organizational characteristics (i.e., tenure, generalist or

specialist, and resources) will influence their prominence in the media coverage
about the refugee issue.
428 American Behavioral Scientist 62(4)

Hypothesis 6b: NGOs’ organizational characteristics (i.e., tenure, generalist or

specialist, and resources) will influence their prominence in the social media con-
versations about the refugee issue.

Method
Sample
Using the database of the Yearbook of International Association (Union of International
Association, 2016), we identified prominent international NGOs the refugee space.
First, we searched the database for keywords such as refugee, immigrants, and immi-
gration to identify relevant NGOs. Then, we read each mission statement to eliminate
duplicates and irrelevant NGOs. This process yielded 463 NGOs.

Dependent Variables
NGOs’ Media Coverage/Information Subsidies.  NGOs’ media coverage and information
subsidies between January 1, 2015, and January 1, 2016, were collected from Lexis-
Nexis and Factiva databases for each NGO. To gather news articles from all “major
world publications” in the LexisNexis database, we searched for each NGO’s name
(and possible variations) and any mentions of the refugee crisis.1 The search parame-
ters yielded 197,708 news articles.

NGOs’ Social Media Mentions on Twitter.  In 2015, 532,000 tweets mentioning “refugee”
were retrieved from public Twitter accounts via the Twitter streaming application pro-
gramming interface. Since on a regular news day, relatively few people discuss the
refugee issue on Twitter, we first identified news spikes—days that media coverage on
the refugee issue was 1 standard deviation above normal. Twenty-four days in 2015
met this criteria. Because conversations on Twitter may take place ahead of or lag
behind news coverage, we expanded the Twitter search to include 1 day before and 1
day after each of the 24 news spike. Furthermore, we searched for each NGO’s name
or Twitter handle to see if these NGOs were mentioned in the social media conversa-
tions about the refugee crisis.

Independent Variables
NGOs’ Information Subsidies.  As noted above, we gathered the information subsidies
from LexisNexis and Factiva. Specifically, we recorded the amount of NGOs’ infor-
mation subsidies such as the press releases, newswire posts, and newsletters sent from
each organization. We used each NGO’s name as the keywords to identity any pieces
of information subsidies provided by NGOs and removed duplicates. On average,
NGOs produced 31.23 (SD = 81.72) information subsidies.

NGOs’ Offline Network Positions. We extracted the network data from the Yearbook
database, which uses NGOs’ self-reports of their alliances and relationships to other
Yang and Saffer 429

organizations. Degree centrality, the total number of ties a focal organization pos-
sesses to other organizations within a network, was calculated for each NGOs to assess
its offline centrality (Borgatti et al., 2013). The mean offline degree centrality was 8.32
(SD = 12.58).

NGOs’ Hyperlink Network Positions.  To assess how well NGOs are connected online, we
used services provided by Uberlink to mine all hyperlinks sent from and received by
the 463 NGOs’ websites. The web crawler returned 36,835 websites connected to the
NGOs’ websites that formed the hyperlink network. We calculated the online in-degree
centrality (the extent to which NGOs receive incoming hyperlinks from other web-
sites) for each NGO to indicate its in-degree centrality online (M = 109.68, SD =
105.33).

Organization-Initiated Engagement on Twitter.  Organization-initiated engagement was

assessed using Tweetchup, a publicly available tool. For each NGO with a Twitter
account, we gathered the number of tweets sent (M = 342.93, SD = 93), the number
of followers mentioned (M = 368.86, SD = 611.00), number of replies (M = 24.80,
SD = 84.30), and number of tweets that were retweets of followers’ tweets (M = 125.07,
SD = 226.75) in 2015. We then calculated the proportion of tweets that mentioned
followers, were replies to followers, or retweets of followers’ tweets to calculate
organization-initiated engagement (M = 0.39, SD = 0.21).

Stakeholder-Initiated Engagement on Twitter.  For stakeholder-initiated engagement, the

same Twitter analysis tool and timeframe were used; however, the variable used to
calculate stakeholder-initiated engagement was different. For this variable, we gath-
ered the number of tweets from each NGO that were retweeted by followers (M = 269.71,
SD = 424.44) and the number of tweets that were favorited by followers (M = 123.51,
SD = 209.82). This measured stakeholders’ engagement with NGOs’ tweets (M = 0.72,
SD = 0.23).

NGOs’Tenure.  The founding year of each NGO was collected from the Yearbook data-
base. Tenure was calculated by subtracting its founding year from 2015, which ranged
from 5 years to 78 years (M = 21.00, SD = 13.25).

Specialist Versus Generalist.  NGOs working on multiple issues may enjoy a broader
range of connections more than their counterparts that only focus on the refugee issue.
Based on NGO’s mission statements, this variable was dichotomized as being either a
generalist (coded as 1) or specialist (coded as 0). NGOs mentioning multiple issues
were coded as generalists (61%) and others focusing exclusively on refugee issues
were coded as specialists (39%).

NGOs’ Organizational Resources. As an indicator of organizational resources, NGOs’

number of staff was obtained from the Yearbook database. The 463 NGOs’ staff size
ranged from one to several thousand staff (i.e., Salvation Army) with a mean of 202
(SD = 840.64) and a median of 15.
430 American Behavioral Scientist 62(4)

Analytic Procedures
Social Network Analyses.  Social network analyses were performed on two networks:
NGOs’ offline network and online hyperlink network. As noted above, a web crawler
that identified the hyperlink network and the Yearbook data identified the NGOs’
offline network. Following standard network analysis procedures (Borgatti et al.,
2013), NGOs’ offline and online centrality scores were calculated using UCINET 6.22
(Borgatti, Everett, & Freeman, 2002).

Hierarchal Regression Analyses. Following the analytic strategy of Malinick et al.

(2013), two hierarchical regressions were performed. The first hierarchical regres-
sion examined the influence of the eight independent variables. Organizations’ char-
acteristics, tenure, generalist/specialist, number of staff, were entered together in the
first model. The subsequent predictors (information subsidies, offline network posi-
tions, hyperlink network positions, organization-initiated engagement, and stake-
holder-initiated engagement) were entered in unique models to study each predictor’s
influence on NGOs’ prominence in the media coverage. The second regression,
using the same procedures and independent variables, assessed NGOs’ prominence
in the social media conversations. To ensure the data met the assumption of collin-
earity, the tolerance and VIF collinearity statistics were reviewed and indicated no
issues of multicollinearity (Keith, 2014). The results of our analytic procedures are
reported next.

Results
Our analyses focus on the 197,708 news articles about the refugee crisis that men-
tioned the 463 NGOs 38,084 times as well as the 532,000 tweets about refugees that
mentioned these NGOs 10,777 times in 2015. The NGOs in our study produced
147,119 tweets in 2015.
The results of our network analyses revealed that the offline network of the 463
NGOs is connected by 498 relationships (see Figure 1). The offline network is sparse,
with an overall density of .005. NGOs working on the refugee crisis have few relation-
ships with one another. A few NGOs take on central network positions in the offline
network, which is suggested by the degree centralization of 12%. As illustrated in
Figure 1, the most central organizations in the offline network, based on their degree
centrality scores, are the International Organization for Migration (degree = 57), the
International Council of Voluntary Agencies (degree = 50), Jesuit Refugee Service
(degree = 37), Migreurope (degree = 23), and Norwegian Refugee Council (degree =
22). In the online network, a different set of NGOs appeared as most central. The most
central organizations were Mercy Corps (degree = 390), Salvation Army (degree =
321), Oxfam United Kingdom (degree = 312), ZOA International (degree = 292), and
Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service (degree = 282). The results of the network
analyses provide a description of the network. Now we turn to the analyses that tested
our hypotheses. Tables 1 and 2 provide detailed results for each model.
Yang and Saffer 431

Figure 1.  International nongovernmental organizations’ offline network on the refugee issue.
Note: The sizes of nodes in this graph are in proportion to their degree centrality. Given the large
number of nodes, only the most prominent organizations are labeled with organization names.

The first set of hypotheses asserts that information subsidies would influence
NGOs’ prominence in the media coverage (Hypothesis 1a) and the social media con-
versations (Hypothesis 1b). Indeed, information subsidies had a statistically signifi-
cant influence (β = 0.54, p < .01) on NGO’s prominence in the media coverage after
controlling for NGOs’ tenure, generalist/specialist, and number of staff, ΔR2 = .07,
F(1, 35) = 10.01, p < .01. Hypothesis 1a was supported. However, NGOs’ information
subsidies did not have a statistically significant influence on social media conversa-
tions, and Hypothesis 1b was rejected. The results support the traditional agenda-
building theory premise that, through public relations efforts, information subsidies
can contribute to increasing NGOs’ prominence in the media coverage.
The next two sets of hypotheses turned the focus to NGO’s network positions.
These hypotheses proposed that NGOs’ online (Hypothesis 2a and Hypothesis 2b) and
offline (Hypothesis 3a and Hypothesis 3b) network positions would influence NGOs’
prominence in the media coverage or social media conversations about the refugee
issue. The results indicated NGOs’ offline network degree centrality did not statisti-
cally significantly influence NGOs’ prominence in either the media coverage or the
432 American Behavioral Scientist 62(4)

Table 1.  Results of Hierarchical Regression Analysis: Effects on Media Coverage.

1 2 3 4 5 6

Variable β β β β β β
1. Tenure, specialist, staff 0.75*** 0.33** 0.32* 0.41* 0.35 0.47**
2. Information subsidies 0.54** 0.57** 0.55** 0.58** 0.42**
3. Hyperlink network 0.11 0.09 0.11 0.39
position
4. Offline network position −0.12 0.09 −0.12
5. Organization-initiated −0.08 −0.08
engagement
6. Stakeholder-initiated 0.26**
engagement
Adjusted R2 .67 .74 .74 .74 .73 .79
ΔR2 .07 .01 .01 .01 .05
ΔF 10.01** 1.66 1.04 0.51 9.47**

Note. All β are standardized coefficients for hierarchical forced entry multiple regressions.
*p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.

Table 2.  Results of Hierarchical Regression Analysis: Social Media Conversations.

1 2 3 4 5 6

Variable β β β β β β
1. Tenure, specialist, staffa −0.45** −0.47** −0.36* −0.36* −0.36* −0.39
2. Information subsidies −0.18 0.21 0.22 0.23 −0.36
3. Hyperlink network position 0.32* 0.33* 0.33* 0.18
4. Offline network position −0.03 0.04 −0.01
5. Organization-initiated −0.04 −0.02
engagement
6. Stakeholder-initiated 0.42**
engagement
Adjusted R2 .15 .14 .22 .19 .17 .31
ΔR2 .01 .09 .01 .01 .13
ΔF 0.34* 4.54* 0.87 0.05 7.34**

Note. All β are standardized coefficients for hierarchical forced entry multiple regressions.
aSpecialist is the only significant variables of the covariates.

*p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.

social media conversations. Hypothesis 2a and Hypothesis 2b were rejected. However,

the results indicated that NGOs’ online network positions (β = 0.32, p < .05) indeed
had a statistically significant influence on NGOs’ prominence in the social media con-
versations, ΔR2 = .22, F(1, 34) = 4.54, p < .05, and Hypothesis 3b was supported. Yet
the same influence was not found in the media coverage (Hypothesis 3a was rejected).
Yang and Saffer 433

Hypothesis 4a and Hypothesis 4b and Hypothesis 5a and Hypothesis 5b were con-

cerned with how NGOs’ organization-initiated engagement and stakeholder-initiated
engagement, respectively, influence NGOs’ prominence in the media coverage and
social media conversations. The results indicate that organization-initiated engage-
ment does not influence NGOs’ prominence in the media coverage or the social media
conversations (Hypothesis 4a and Hypothesis 4b were both rejected). However, stake-
holders’ engagement with organizational social media content did. The results revealed
that stakeholder-initiated engagement (β = 0.26, p < .01) had a statistically significant
influence on media coverage, ΔR2 = .79, F(1, 30) = 9.47, p < .01, and Hypothesis 5a
was supported. Furthermore, stakeholder-initiated engagement (β = 0.42, p < .01) had
a statistically significant influence on NGOs’ prominence in the social media conver-
sations about the refugee issue, ΔR2 = .31, F(1, 31) = 7.43, p < .01, and Hypothesis 5b
was supported.
Finally, the last set of hypotheses examined the organizational characteristics that
influence the media coverage and the social media conversations. The results for the
previous hypotheses (Hypothesis 1 through Hypothesis 5) controlled for these organi-
zational characteristics. However, when specifically looking at these variables, the
results suggest that the number of staff employed at an NGO (β = 0.75, p < .001) sig-
nificantly influenced an NGO’s prominence in the media coverage, R2 = .67, F(3, 36)
= 27.32, p < .001, and Hypothesis 6a was partially supported. When NGOs like CARE
International who have more staff than most other NGOs, they are more likely to
employ communication professionals who produce information subsidies and social
media content that stakeholders engage with. Such an approach in turn influences an
organization’s prominence in the media coverage and the social media conversation,
as found in Hypothesis 1a, Hypothesis 5a, and Hypothesis 5b. Last, turning to the
organizational characteristics that influence social media conversations, the results
indicated that NGOs designated as specialists (i.e., focused specifically on the refugee
crisis; β = −0.45, p < .01) had a significant influence on NGOs’ prominence in the
social media conversations, R2 = .15, F(3, 36) = 3.31, p < .05. Hypothesis 6b was par-
tially supported. NGOs such as the International Rescue Committee that work specifi-
cally on the refugee issue were more prominent in the social media conversation.

Discussion
Our study examined the effects of a range of variables to understand how NGOs can
advocate for refugees by influencing the agendas of both traditional media coverage
and social media conversations about the refugee issue. Our findings reveal that
agenda building on traditional media and in social media conversations require differ-
ent strategies. As expected, information subsidies influence traditional media coverage
but its effect waned in the context of social media conversations. In contrast, although
NGOs’ hyperlink network positions did not seem to affect their prominence in tradi-
tional media, NGOs’ online network centrality emerged as an influential predictor for
NGOs’ prominence in social media conversations. We also found that stakeholder-
initiated engagement influences both traditional media coverage and social media
434 American Behavioral Scientist 62(4)

conversations. Finally, organizational resources and status were found to be important

factors both in the media coverage and social media conversations. The implications
of these findings are discussed below.

Information Subsidies and Agenda Building in Traditional Media

Coverage
NGOs’ efforts to raise public support for refugees could benefit substantially through
obtaining media coverage (Kim & Kiousis, 2012). Public relations scholars have
developed the agenda-building theory and argued that organizations’ communication
strategies such as information subsidies could effectively influence media coverage
(Kim & Kiousis, 2012; Kiousis et al., 2016). Our findings were consistent with agenda-
building theory, and found that NGOs’ information subsidies increased their promi-
nence in media coverage.
As mentioned earlier, most previous agenda-building studies were conducted in the
context of political public relations (Kiousis et al., 2006; Kiousis et al., 2007). To the
best of our knowledge, this study is the first to show that civil actors such as NGOs can
also take a page from political and corporate actors’ playbook and effectively influ-
ence the media coverage, as well as social media conversations, through public rela-
tions strategies and tactics. Our study illustrates the applicability of the agenda-building
theory to guide the communication efforts of civil society actors.
As the refugee crisis has continued to capture the attention of global audiences, the
intensified media coverage of this issue brings considerable opportunities and chal-
lenges for NGOs. Previous agenda-building research found evidence that media cov-
erage could affect public policy (Kiousis et al., 2016). In the heated debate over how
countries should handle the crisis, if NGOs’ voices are missing, their chance to influ-
ence policy outcomes may also diminish. As organizations directly interact with mil-
lions of refugees, NGOs often possess first-hand information and many staff and
volunteers may personally know about refugees’ struggle and stories. NGOs should
purposively accumulate credible information and human-interest stories that reflect
the reality of refugees’ journey and struggle and strategically distribute such informa-
tion though information subsidies.

Network Positions and Agenda Building in Social Media Conversations

Our study finds that NGOs’ relationship building and network positions influenced
their agenda-building outcomes. These findings extend agenda-building theory by
reconceptualizing and expanding what accounts for public relations strategies. Moving
beyond traditional media relations functions, another essential function of public rela-
tions is relationship building, and relationships matter a great deal in the networked
context of digital communication. Our findings revealed that although NGOs’ online
network position exerted a limited influence over traditional media coverage, it sig-
nificantly influenced NGOs’ prominence in social media conversations regarding the
refugee crisis.
Yang and Saffer 435

A number of reasons may account for the observed effect. First, as aforementioned,
hyperlink networks can set the boundary of issues and define the framework of refer-
ence. As explained by Young and Leonardi (2012), when publics search the Internet in
an effort to understand an issue such as the refugee crisis, they reflectively observe the
connections among organizations working on this issue. As such, NGOs that receive a
large number of incoming hyperlinks may stand out as the authorities on these issues.
Furthermore, the effect of power law distribution may further push NGOs with high
in-degree centralities to emerge on the top of search results (Barabási, 2003). In other
words, either when publics navigate through websites or when they search for infor-
mation sources through search engines, they are more likely to reach on the sites of the
most central NGOs.
This finding holds considerable implications for NGOs’ communication practice.
As argued by Shumate and Lipp (2008), NGOs’ hyperlink network is a form of con-
nective collective action that helps NGOs attract attention to their issues and magnify
their voices in the virtual space. Our findings highlight the idea that NGOs need to
strategically utilize their hyperlinks. In the analysis, we noticed that many NGOs were
disconnected from others. This observation revealed an existing problem in the NGO
community and also a potential strategic option that NGOs can utilize to enhance their
prominence in the digital sphere. Disconnected NGOs need to join the network by
connecting with the most central NGOs. Such an action could increase the density of
the overall hyperlink network and further promotes the prominence of central NGOs
as well as the overall community.

Stakeholder-Initiated Engagement and Agenda Building

Stakeholder-initiated engagement is another type of important strategy. Our study reveals
that stakeholder-initiated engagement is also important for agenda-building purposes.
During the refugee crisis, many NGOs used digital platforms such as Twitter to engage
the public. When engagement is merely pushed from organizations to stakeholders, it
exerts limited impact on the media’s agenda or social media conversations. This is because
the distance that such messages can travel is limited by the size of NGOs’ networks, or the
number of followers they have on Twitter. Nonetheless, when stakeholders voluntarily
engage with NGOs, this type of engagement powerfully influenced both media coverage
and social media conversations. It is likely that when stakeholders engage with NGOs,
they are more likely to mention NGOs or spread out NGOs’ messages in their tweets or
retweets. These actions allow NGOs’ messages to travel through these stakeholders’
social networks and reach more audiences (Chen & Fu, 2016). NGOs’ influence thus gets
exponentially magnified through the power of stakeholders’ networks. Consequentially,
as previous studies suggested, traditional media often pick up trends in social media and
social media conversations may influence the agenda of traditional media coverage. In
other words, stakeholder-initiated engagement and their social media conversations may
further help NGOs to build the agenda of traditional media.
This finding validates the idea that NGOs’ effort to engage with their stakeholders
via Twitter could facilitate their agenda-building effort. However, it is important to
436 American Behavioral Scientist 62(4)

note that such engagement efforts should resonate with stakeholders and reflect stake-
holders’ interests and values. Merely posting information or providing updates on
social media are insufficient as our research reveals that engagement from NGOs
alone had little effect. Stakeholders have to get on board and actively engage with
NGOs. NGOs need to understand their stakeholders’ interests, and design their engage-
ment tactics that could make stakeholders “answer back.”

NGOs’ Characteristics and Agenda Building

We identified organizational factors that contribute to some NGOs’ prominence in the
media coverage and in social media conversations. Our findings suggest that NGOs
specializing on the refugee issue tend to emerge as central actors in social media con-
versations. This finding is different from that of another NGO network study, in which
Shumate and Lipp (2008) found that generalist NGOs, or NGOs with heterogeneous
goals, play several key roles in the NGOs’ network. One possible explanation is that
the refugee crisis requires considerable specialty knowledge and existing connections
from NGOs to be able to provide relevant medical, legal, and sheltering service. In
such a context, NGOs specializing in the refugee issue may be perceived as more
trustworthy than NGOs whose resources are scattered across issue fields. Along this
line, our results also suggest that NGOs with longer tenure tend to be more influential.
This finding is consistent with previous research (Shumate & Lipp, 2008), which gen-
erally found NGOs with more abundant experiences emerge as leaders in their respec-
tive issue fields.
Furthermore, the study found that NGOs with more staff tend to be more prominent
in traditional media coverage. There can be several explanations. First, NGOs with
more staff are likely to be larger NGOs, which are often perceived as more legitimate.
When journalists seek expert opinions about the refugee crisis, such NGOs are more
likely to be sought after as credible sources. Second, research found that NGOs with
more staff may also have more human resources to produce quality information subsi-
dies and to work with journalists for interviews or questions. It is likely both factors
played a role in promoting some NGOs’ voices.

Limitations and Recommendations for Future Research

The current study does have some limitations. First, in terms of evidence for NGOs’
agenda-building efforts, the study focused on the mentioning of NGOs in media cover-
age and in social media conversations. Nonetheless, little is known if specific NGOs’
messages such as their talking points or their framing of the topics were also promi-
nent in the media coverage. Future studies may use thematic analysis to compare and
evaluate the difference and similarity between NGOs’ messages and that of media
coverage and public’s conversation. Second, in terms of agenda building on traditional
media, this study assessed media coverage from different countries of origin and levels
of prominence together. Future studies may compare NGOs’ capacity to build agendas
in different categories of media and examine which type of media are more likely to
Yang and Saffer 437

be influenced by NGOs. Finally, a large portion of our data were based on news spike
events. It is likely that the media and the public’s information needs about the refugee
issue increased during those events and some journalists may actively reach out to
NGOs for information and comments. This dynamic could significantly contribute to
NGOs’ prominence. Future studies should further explore how NGOs can better antic-
ipate and prepare information materials for newsworthy events, and provide the media
and the public with trustworthy and valuable information.

Conclusion
Public discourse about socially significant issues such as the international refugee
crisis often profoundly influence public policy and social change. In the crowded net-
worked public sphere, NGOs’ voices often have to compete with ideological foes and
even misinformation or bots. The agenda-building approach takes an organizational
perspective and identifies NGOs’ communication strategies that build agenda in the
media coverage and in social media conversations. This approach offers both theoreti-
cal directions for future research and practical recommendations for enhancing NGOs’
prominence in digital and traditional media. Specifically, our findings reveal that in
addition to organizational characteristics and information subsidies, NGOs’ hyperlink
network positions and stakeholder-initiated engagement are crucial for NGOs to gar-
ner media coverage and appear in social media conversations. Looking ahead, millions
of refugees may continue to be plagued by the refugee crisis. These foreseeable chal-
lenges call for more relevant theories and applied research to improve the efficiency of
NGOs’ communication and raise public awareness and support.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship,
and/or publication of this article.

Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of
this article.

Note
1. In LexisNexis, “major world publications” is one of the options for sources of news cover-
age. This list includes 209 news publications that are “from around the world [and] are held
in high esteem for their content reliability,” according to the description in LexisNexis. A
complete list of publications under the “major world publication” options can be found
here: http://w3.nexis.com/sources/scripts/info.pl?237924&GCC=true

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Author Biographies
Aimei Yang, Ph.D., University of Oklahoma, is an assistant professor at the University of
Southern California. Her research interests focus on civil actors’ issue advocacy and issue net-
works. Her articles have appeared in journals such as Communication Theory, Business &
Society, Journal of Business Ethics,  Environmental Communication, Journal of Applied
Communication Research, and Management Communication Quarterly.
Adam Saffer, Ph.D., University of Oklahoma, is an assistant professor at the University of
North Carolina, Chapel Hill. His research research takes a network perspective to explore the
areas of advocacy and activism, social networks, and interactive communication technologies in
public relations. His articles have appeared in journals such as Journal of Communication,
Management Communication Quarterly, Journal of Public Relations Research, and Public
Relations Review.

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