Agenda-setting strategies in EU policy processes

Abstract

This paper develops a typology of strategies used by political actors to place issues on the Europena Union (EU) agenda. In doing so, it builds on a theoretically derived twofold distinction between two challenges in putting issues on the agenda (gaining attention and building credibility) and two factors that actors can affect (venues and frames). The resulting four types of strategy are further specified on the basis of the existing case study literature on EU agenda-setting. This results in a typology that elucidates the political rationales behind agenda-setting strategies and applies to all types of actors in EU policy-making. The typology can be used to understand the interrelationships between different (types of) strategies, to identify opposing strategies meant to keep issues off the EU agenda, and to compare agenda-setting processes in the EU and domestic political systems.

Keywords:

• Agenda-setting
• European Union
• political strategies
• typology

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Earlier drafts of this paper were presented at the 5th ECPR General Conference, Potsdam, 10–12 September 2009, and the NIG Annual Conference, Leiden, 12–13 November 2009. The author thanks the participants in these events, in particular Menno Fenger and Guy Peters, and two anonymous referees for JEPP, for their valuable comments.