Lecture 10 Agenda Setting

How the media construct the reality?

Agenda setting is social construction of reality. Reality exists but the way we come to know it, talk about it, understand it, is mediated through social life. 

Bruce also introduce 4 types of agenda that is interrelated :

Public agenda - what public think it is important

Policy agenda - what 'decision maker' think it is important

Corporate agenda - what business and big corporations think it is important

Media agenda - what media think it is important

Then he talked about the definition of agenda and the relationship between reality, media reality and public perception of reality. The concept of agenda settings comes from few people. In the 1920s, Harold Lasswell said that it is what the mass media' injects' direct influence into the audience. In 1922, Walter Lippman argued that people rely on the images in their minds in formulating judgement rather than critical thinking. And lastly, in 1968 Maxwell McCombs and Donald Shaw said the mass media set the agenda by emphasizing specific topics. One example is how Hitler used it to rise his power. The media has huge influence on the public. 

There's two levels of agenda setting theory.First level of agenda setting  theory talks about what the public should focus and the second level is about how people should think about an issue. 

I also learned about the agenda setting 'family', the strength and weakness of agenda settings.

Agenda settings plays an important role in politics. If some parties have control on certain media, they will get to decide which news to be published or which to ignored or belittle. Maybe they will focus on how good they are and talked about the flaws in opposition parties. It all depends on how ethical is the journalism sector in that particular country. If it is abused, it will hide the truth from the public and influence their ability to make the right choices.