This document summarizes key concepts around the social construction of problems and the use of statistics in policy debates. It discusses how problems are defined depending on political goals, and how symbols, causal stories, and numbers are used to shape perceptions of problems. Numbers in particular require careful interpretation, as choices around metrics and outliers can distort interpretations. Overall, the social construction of problems and selective use of statistics allows interests to frame issues in ways that support their policy preferences.

1. Chapter 5
Agenda Setting, Power, and
Interest Groups
Professor: 하재룡 교수님
Presenter: Meghanath Poudel
2021.05.20
Graduate School of Sun Moon University, South
Korea
An Introduction to the
POLICY PROCESS
Theories, Concepts, And Models of Public Policy Making

2. 5. Agenda Setting, Power, and Interest
Groups
 The Social Construction of Problems and Issues
 The Social Construction of Problems
 Conditions and Problems
 Symbols
 Causal Stories
 Numbers as Indicators of Problems
 Case Study
 The Exxon Valdez Oil Spill and Causal Stories
 Conclusion

3. The Social Construction of Problems and Issues
 Democratic governments and Humans
problem solvers.
Social and technological advances: Vaccination is a solution to disease, the electrical light is a superior solution to the
desire for illumination at night, and the wheel, the railroad, the telephone, the airplane, and the Internet etc.
 However, many social problems are still there. Poverty, illiteracy, racism, immorality, disease, disaster, crime, and any
number of other ills will lead people and groups to press for solutions.
 These social problems require that governmental action be taken because services required to alleviate public
problems that are not or cannot be addressed by private actors are public goods that can primarily be provided by
government actors.
 The economic and social conservatives believe in limited government activity, these conservatives also believe there
are public goods, such as regulation of securities markets, road building, national defense, and public safety, that
are most properly addressed by government.
 Who should remedy this problem? Before concerning ourselves with whether public or private actors must remedy
the problem, it is probably best to think about problems by thinking first about a clear definition of the problem
itself.
5. Agenda Setting, Power, and Interest Groups

4.  Problems can be defined and depicted in many different ways, depending on the goals of the proponent
of the particular depiction of a problem and the nature of the problem and the political debate. The
process of defining problems and of selling a broad population on this definition is called social
construction. Social construction refers to the ways in which we as a society and the various contending
interests within it structure and tell the stories about how problems come to be the way they are.
 Problem: The American Heritage Dictionary defines a problem as "a question or situation that presents
uncertainty, perplexity, or difficulty" or "the source of trouble or annoyance." In politics and public policy, it
is not hard to think of many problems that create all these feelings. Economic problems, the uneven
distribution of resources, the forces of nature, the spread of diseases, social disorder, rapid technological
change, fetters on business success caused by regulation, and many other features of modem life create
considerable annoyance and uncertainty to some or many people. Indeed, we can think of public policy as
being intended to solve problems so that some measure of uncertainty can be reduced.
Social construction: The process by which issues
and problems are defined in society.
The Social Construction of Problems
5. Agenda Setting, Power, and Interest Groups

5.  However, many policies that reduce one group's or person's uncertainty create a burden or greater uncertainty or
"annoyance" for others. For some, a pressing problem about which immediate action is required is for others
merely a fact-sometimes unpleasant-about which nothing can be done, or a condition. People and groups will
work very hard to prove that a problem is a problem about which something can and should be done.
 The way a problem is defined is an important part of this persuasive process and is important in the choice of
solutions. Joseph Gusfield argues that one can look at the drunken driving problem in a number of ways. Most of
us tend to look at the drunken driving problem as one of individual responsibility: this presumes that stiffer
penalties to punish the responsible are needed to address the problem. But what if we looked at the problem as
one of inadequate transportation? If the United States had better systems of mass transit, it is likely that fewer
people would need to drink and drive; they could drink and ride a bus or a train.
 The social construction of a problem is linked to the existing social, political, and ideological structures at the time.
Americans still value individual initiative and responsibility, and therefore make drinking and driving at least as
much a matter of personal responsibility as of social responsibility. The same values of self- reliance and individual
initiative are behind many of our public policies, dealing with free enterprise, welfare, and other economic policies.
The Social Construction of Problems
5. Agenda Setting, Power, and Interest Groups

6. Conditions and Problems
 Conditions can develop over time into problems as people develop ways to address conditions.
Until Dr. Jonas Salk developed the polio vaccine, millions of child and their parents lived in fear of
this crippling disease. Without the polio vaccine, this disease was simply a dreaded condition that
could perhaps be avoided (people kept their kids away from swimming pools, for example, to avoid
contracting polio) but certainly not treated or prevented without very high social costs.
 However, as medical technology progressed, polio became a problem about which something more
effective than quarantining children could be done. In this case, governments in particular, public
health officials-have responded by encouraging or directly providing polio vaccine to children.
When people become dependent on solutions to previously addressed problems, then the
interruption of the solution will often constitute a major problem, resulting in efforts to prevent any
such interruptions.
5. Agenda Setting, Power, and Interest Groups

7. Symbols
 A symbol is "anything that stands for something else. Its meaning depends on how people
interpret it, use it, or respond to it." Politics is full of symbols, some perceived as good, others as
bad, and still others as controversial. Some symbols are fairly obvious: the American flag, for
example, is generally respected in the United States, while flying a flag bearing the Nazi swastika
just about anywhere in the world is considered in very bad taste (and, indeed, is illegal in many
countries).
 Deborah Stone outlines some elements of the use of symbols.
 First, she discusses narrative stories, which are stories told about how things happen, good or bad. They
are usually highly simplified and offer the hope that complex problems can be solved with relatively easy
solutions.
5. Agenda Setting, Power, and Interest Groups

8.  Helplessness and control is another common story of how something once could not be done but now something
can be done about an issue or problem. This story is closely related to the condition/problem tension.
 Thus, as Stone notes, the idea of the cheating "welfare queen" took hold in the 1980s, even though such people
represented a small and atypical portion of the welfare population. Related to such stories are "horror stories" of
government regulation run amok.
 Such stories are usually distorted: Stone cites the example of how those opposed to industry regulation claimed that
the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) "abolished the tooth fairy" by requiring that dentists
discard any baby teeth they pulled; the actual regulation merely required that appropriate steps be taken to protect
health workers from any diseases that may be transmitted in handling the teeth. The media stirred up a small
controversy by reporting that OSHA was advising companies with home workers that companies are responsible for
the health and safety of these home workers in their own offices.
 The media, elected officials, and business interests raised the specter of OSHA invading every home worker's privacy
to inspect their work space; this horror story, coupled with long-standing industry dislike for OSHA and the prior
propagation of horror stories, made this a very compelling and disturbing prospect. The truth of the matter was more
subtle: OSHA had simply sent a letter to an employer that interpreted its existing rules on workplace safety, stating
that the employer does bear some responsibility for home workers' safety in home offices. Regardless of this
important distinction, OSHA backed away from the letter in the face of media ridicule and political pressure.
Symbols
5. Agenda Setting, Power, and Interest Groups

9. Causal Stories
Causal story: A narrative description of the causes of a public problem; such stories often contain
normative statements about both the problem itself and the person, institution, or social arrangements
that are said to have caused the problem.
Source: From Policy Paradox and Political Reason by Deborah A. Stone.
Types of Causal Theories with Examples
An important part of storytelling in public
policy is the telling of causal stories. These
stories attempt to explain what caused a
problem or an outcome.
These stories are important in public policy
making because the depiction of the cause of
a problem strongly suggests a solution to the
problem. In general, Stone divides causal
stories into four categories: mechanical causes,
accidental causes, intentional causes, and
inadvertent causes.
5. Agenda Setting, Power, and Interest Groups

10. Numbers as Indicators of Problems
 Debates and controversies often involve the use of numerical information to make their points. Such numbers include the
number of people living in poverty, the average amount of taxes people pay to the government, the number of people killed
or hurt by various hazards, and so on. The use of numbers in policy debates is very attractive because numbers appear to
have accuracy that anecdotal evidence lacks. particularly when the numbers provide a description of aggregate data that is,
when the data reflect a broader phenomenon. Such aggregate data include the unemployment rate, average school test
scores, median family income, and the like.
Aggregate data: Data based on the adding up, or aggregation, of smaller data points. For example, data on the average family income
in the U.S. census in based on smaller data elements gathered then aggregated for analysis.
 The use of numbers is particularly interesting, as Stone points out, because deciding to count a phenomenon is a policy
decision itself. We collect data about phenomena because we want to know something more about them. We count
unemployment, crime, health, education, and other statistics. Once we begin to start counting, there is considerable pressure
to continue counting to see how problems are behaving: we want indicators of good things to go up (the gross domestic
product [GDP], wages, educational achievement) and bad things to go down (diseases and death, crime, welfare rolls). For
each of these things, there is political pressure to make the problem better.
 But numbers are not entirely objective measures of a phenomenori. Indeed, they are indicators of a problem; that is, they
measure the underlying problem, but they are not the same as the underlying problem itself. Some of these indicators are
problematic, for several reasons.
5. Agenda Setting, Power, and Interest Groups

11.  First, the numbers themselves are of questionable accuracy. Numbers on the GDP, unemployment, inflation, test scores, and so on have often
been challenged. The census, which the Constitution requires be taken every ten years, is notorious for undercounting immigrants and minorities,
placing cities at a disadvantage in the allocation of federal funds dispersed on the basis of population. On the other hand, statistical methods
that might correct this undercount could intro- duce more error in the census than they would alleviate. A distinguished panel of statisticians
found, ultimately, that the solution to the undercounting problem is less a technical problem than it is a social or political matter.
 Educational tests, such as the Scholastic Assessment Test (SAT), or the tests that are becoming popular ways of assessing educational
performance, and which are often used to assess whether students are allowed to advance in school or to graduate, are often said to be biased
on the basis of race, class, and gender in favor of white males from well-to-do families, such that the scores do not accurately reflect the
academic potential of all the people who are taking the tests. Perhaps the most notoriously questionable statistics come from the Uniform Crime
Reports (UCR), collected by the United States Department of Justice.
 The UCR compiles of crime from police departments nationwide; but the reports include only the crimes about which the police have
information. They do not include unreported crimes; what is more, some police departments may have an incentive to inflate or underreport
crimes. In some cases, when police place special emphasis particular crimes such as domestic violence, the apparent rate of crime goes because
more crime is reported and known to the police.
 Second, even if some measures are reasonably accurate, an important question remains: whether the indicator in question is the best measure of
a phenomenon or of progress toward a goal. For example, the GDP is a measure of all the goods and services produced in the nation; when it is
growing from quarter to quarter or year to year, this is said to be a good thing; the financial press concentrates a great deal of attention on this
figure. Yet the GDP may not be the best measure of overall well- being.
 Does the GDP, for example, deduct from the value of some goods the pollution and subsequent environmental damage they cause? Indeed, if
there is an environmental disaster, such as an oil spill, the mopey spent to clean up the spill is included in the GDP. Other things that perhaps we
would not want to spend money on, such as lawyers' fees, cancer treatment, and fixing car wrecks, are all counted in the GDP. Thus. economic
growth may not equate with the good life, but rather reflects all the things that we spend money on, including the things we might not really
want to buy.
Numbers as Indicators of Problems
5. Agenda Setting, Power, and Interest Groups

12.  Many of you have taken (or are required to take) a statistics class or two in your studies as social science, science, or other
majors. Many of us approach such classes with trepidation. But the example of the use (or abuse) of statistics I am about to
illustrate shows how useful some background in statistics can be for your own political self-defense. Being able to find and
explain statistical fallacies is a very important skill in our number-driven world.
 The choice of the statistic being reported has a big influence on how one is supposed to interpret the underlying idea being
conveyed. For example, let us take King County, Washington, the county that includes Seattle and, more to the point here,
Redmond, the home of Microsoft. There are at least three major billionaires in the Seattle area: Microsoft founder Bill Gates, who
is worth over $100 billion; Paul Allen, a cofounder of Microsoft, worth about $50 billion; and Jeff Bezos, founder of AmaZon.com,
worth at least $5 billion.
 There are about 3 million people in King County, but let us assume that there are only 100 people in the county: the three
mentioned and ninety-seven other people. each with a net worth of $1 million, which is not poverty level, but is a hundred
thousand times less wealthy than Bill Gates. If we were to simply average all 10 people's net worth, we would say that these 100
100 people were very, very wealthy indeed, with an average net worth of a little more than $1.5 billion! But what if We choose to
represent this community's wealth by showing the median net worth: the median is the middle value in a set of values. In our
example, the middle value is million; that is, over one thousand times less than the average. Or we could represent the wealth of
the category by showing the modal value, which is the most often occurring value in the series, which is also $1 million.
Numbers as Indicators of Problems
5. Agenda Setting, Power, and Interest Groups

13.  This example is less an expression of the prosperity of King County than it is an extreme example of how the choice of
statistics can influence the conclusion we reach about information. In statistical terms, Bill Gates, Paul Allen, and Jeff
Bezos are called outliers-they fall outside the range of the bulk of the data points. This example shows why we
sometimes talk in terms of median figures, such as median family income or median home prices: because if we used
the mean or average of these figures, the few outliers, such as the really expensive houses or the really well-paid people,
would distort the story we are trying to tell with the numbers.
 make an affirmative argument about the overall prosperity of the people in King County, even if this prosperity isn't
equally shared.
 Outlier: In statistics, a case (that in, a data point) that falls so far below or above the main cluster of data points that it significantly
significantly influences the mean value of all the data. A very large outlier will cause the mean to greatly exceed the median, or
middle value; a very small outlier will cause the mean to fall far below the median value.
 Finally, two things you should know about numbers and their depiction in policy debates: First, advocates for policy
positions will always choose numbers that put their arguments in the best light. This means that the use of numbers is
likely to be significantly skewed or distorted for rhetorical advantage. This distortion is most often seen in charts and
graphs, which citizens and policy makers must use with extreme caution.
 Second, and summarizing this discussion, there is a difference between a number (that is, a data point) and the
interpretation of that data. There is an old saying in information management that there is a big difference between data
and information: data are just the raw numbers, while information is what we get when we interpret the numbers-and as
you know, that information is very much subject to the interpretation of those with a stake in the meaning of that
information.
Numbers as Indicators of Problems
5. Agenda Setting, Power, and Interest Groups

14. Case Study
The Exxon Valdez Oil Spill and Causal Stories
 Contestants in policy disputes will fight for the depiction of the cause of a problem that is most consistent with their goals.
A particularly apt example of disputes over causal stories is the story about the causes of the Exxon Valdez oil spill in
1989. The Exxon Valdez ran aground in Prince William Sound, spilling about 11 million gallons of oil into what was often
depicted as "pristine wilderness." Immediately, the search began for someone to blame for the spill: who caused the spill
of the Exxon Valdez? Exxon and the captain of the Exxon Valdez, Joseph Hazelwood, argued that the spill was an accident
or an "act of God," because the tanker was trying to avoid icebergs that had broken from nearby Columbia Glacier.
 This explanation was widely dismissed, because the captain was discovered to have been legally drunk and because of his
apparently poor seamanship. Exxon's opponents argued that Exxon assumed the blame for staffing cuts on tankers
leading to tired and stressed crews, and blamed the oil companies for failing to keep the promises they made when the
pipeline was originally built. in these stories, the cause moved from the realm of accident to the realm of inadvertent
causes: the spill was caused by the captain's "carelessness" or even Exxon's "avoidable ignorance" of the likelihood of a
spill and its consequences.
 Many environmental groups, however, moved the causal theory to the "intended" side of Stone's typology. They argued
that lax government regulation and continued pressures for profit led Exxon to take shortcuts in the hiring, training, and
supervision of its tanker crews. Crews did not get enough rest for the grueling voyage from Alaska to California, and
ships were understaffed compared with previous years. Meanwhile, the oil industry had failed to meet its obligations to
be ready to respond to an Exxon Valdez-sized oil spill.
5. Agenda Setting, Power, and Interest Groups

15.  These three stories-the act of God, drunken captain, and willfully negligent company stories-all competed for public
attention and sympathy. In the end, Exxon suffered a severe public relations blow because its preferred stories were not
well accepted. Federal law passed in the wake of the spill accepted the story that the government and industry had been
lax in addressing the potential of a large spill and created a new regulatory scheme, initially opposed by industry, that
would make such spills much more expensive, from a clean-up and liability perspective, than they had been before the
spill.
 In the end, the policy reflected the causal story that was most broadly accepted, thereby illustrating the importance of
telling plausible and persuasive stories. This is why interest groups and companies hire public relations firms and spend
millions a year burnishing their images and the stories of their companies' work.
 Can you think of other kinds of causal stories? What sort of stories do people tell to illustrate why some people are rich,
and others are poor? What stories are told about the causes of crime, homelessness, or poor academic performance in
our schools? What stories did people tell to help explain why terrorists hijacked planes and crashed them into the
Pentagon and the World Trade Center on September 11. 2001? Are these stories based on the careful gathering of
evidence? Or on appeals to emotion and preexisting ideas about how the world works?
Case Study
The Exxon Valdez Oil Spill and Causal Stories
5. Agenda Setting, Power, and Interest Groups

16. Conclusion
 The study of agenda setting is a particularly fruitful way to begin to understand how groups,
power, and the agenda interact to set the boundaries of political policy debate. But agenda
setting, like all other stages of the policy process, does not occur in a vacuum.
 The likelihood that an issue will rise on the agenda is a function of the issue itself, the actors
that get involved, institutional relationships, and, often, random social and political factors
that can be explained but cannot be replicated or predicted.
~The End~
5. Agenda Setting, Power, and Interest Groups