Does Data Drive Policymaking? A Multiple Streams Perspective on the Relationship Between Indicators and Agenda Setting

2021/01/17 by Rob A. DeLeo, Alex Duarte · 3 citations
Social Sciences · #Electoral Systems and Political Participation #Policy Transfer and Learning #Qualitative Comparative Analysis Research

paper · doi:10.1111/psj.12419

openalex publication_date 2021/01/17 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/26

Abstract

The multiple streams framework (MSF) hypothesizes changes in problem indicators or data documenting the scale and scope a problem help draw policymaker attention to previously ignored issues. We test this hypothesis by systematically analyzing agenda setting and agenda denial in the United States Congress in response to indicators of the opioid crisis, namely opioid overdose deaths. We confirm that changes in indicators can, in some cases, help facilitate agenda setting and policy change. However, we also show indicator politicization, which refers to the extent to which changes in a particular indicator threaten the economic and political interests of groups operating in the political stream, is inversely related to issue attention. We, therefore, suggest refining existing MSF hypotheses to allow for a more nuanced understanding of the relationship between indicators and agenda setting.

Citations

• Straightening the three streams: Theorising extensions of the multiple streams framework
• A River Runs Through It: A Multiple Streams Meta‐Review
• Modeling Multilevel Data Structures
• Do crises lead to policy change? The multiple streams framework and the European Union’s economic governance instruments
• Using the Multiple Streams Framework to Connect Policy Adoption to Implementation

Cited by

• Strategies of agenda denial: Anti-gender opposition to LGBTQ+ policies in Italy
• The Power of Framing: Institutional Policy Entrepreneurship in the EU's Wildfire Risk Management (WFRM)
• Mixing and matching: Intra‐stream interdependence in the multiple streams framework and the adoption of policy mixes

Related

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• Pandemic Policymaking: Learning the Lower Dimensional Manifold of Congressional Responsiveness
• Media Coverage Shifts and Policy Overreactions: Evidence on Government Serial Processing and Information Saturation
• Travelling Far and Wide? Applying the Multiple Streams Framework to Policy-Making in Autocracies