Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Agenda Setting - http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/8519685.stm

This article details the changeover in the British Tory Party, a conservative party much like the Republican party in the States, to supporting gay rights. The agenda setting part is very obvious: including gay politicians in their party, they hope to swing the gay community's vote back towards them, to increase their chances of election/re-election and increase their power within the British Parliament. The article deals with issue priming and framing as well. The priming aspect comes from the public's previous viewpoints on the homosexual community and the news coverage they received. Now as the country becomes more and more progressive, citizens were not responding well to the too-conservative policys of the Tory party. Acknowledging this failure, the party then uses a new framework to change the publics viewpoint of their stand towards gay rights. Image priming is another factor, although not quite as large. The head spokesperson, Mr. Herbert, who is openly gay, is the new face of the party, and some 15 other politicians, also openly gay, portray a "gay-friendly" face to the party. This combination of issue/image priming, framing are used well under the umbrella of agenda setting and effectively show the system in action.

1 comment:

  1. Sorry, I forgot to include this and couldn't figure out how to edit it

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/8519685.stm - link to original piece of news.

    Julian Peck

    ReplyDelete