Conditional Coupling of Multiple Streams: A Relational Approach

When studying agenda setting with the Multiple Streams Framework (MSF), we generally expect a policy entrepreneur to place an issue on the agenda by coupling the streams within a policy window (Kingdon, 2011). Studying this relationship between policy windows and coupling has profited from regarding the latter as a discursive, the ambiguous world interpreting act (Blum, 2018; Winkel & Leipold, 2016). At the same time, a growing attention for MSF applications in the phase of decision-making has brought the originally disregarded institutional context of these dynamics back in (Zahariadis, 2016; Zohlnhöfer, Herweg, & Huß, 2015). Therefore, the state of research has become more aware of both, discourses and institutions. While this is not a contradiction, methodological challenges arise from studying Multiple Streams integrating both perspectives. We suggest strengthening the relational characteristic of discursive coupling by understanding it as a dichotomous or partial (Dolan, 2019) phenomenon and conceptualizing it as a bipartite network. More specifically, discourse network analysis (Leifeld, 2016) allows for an assessment of the connection of concepts from different streams by their joint utilization by entrepreneurs. This enables us to study the dependence of coupling on policy windows: Problem windows are expected to encourage a coupling of policies ‘searching’ for problems, whereas attribution of responsibility for policies should benefit from political windows. The other way around, communicating actors can be mapped as networks according to their joint reference to a particular concept. This facilitates identifying entrepreneurs and institutional contexts based on their affiliations, but also based on institutionalized ideas. The proposed research strategy is illustrated by an empirical inquiry of media discourses on the amendment of the German fertilizer ordinance in 2017 as a reaction to a EU claim because of nitrate pollution (Möck, Vogeler, Bandelow, & Schröder, 2019). References Blum, S. (2018). The Multiple-Streams Framework and Knowledge Utilization: Argumentative Couplings of Problem, Policy, and Politics Issues. European Policy Analysis, 4(1), 94-117. Dolan, D. A. (2019). Multiple Partial Couplings in the Multiple Streams Framework: The Case of Extreme Weather and Climate Change Adaptation. Policy Studies Journal. doi:10.1111/psj.12341. Kingdon, J. W. (2011). Agendas, Alternatives, and Public Policies (2nd ed.). New York: Longman. Leifeld, P. (2016). Policy Debates as Dynamic Networks. German Pension Politics and Privatization Discourse. Frankfurt/New York: Campus. Möck, M., Vogeler, C. S., Bandelow, N. C., & Schröder, B. (2019). Layering Action Situations to Integrate Spatial Scales, Resource Linkages, and Change over Time: The Case of Groundwater Management in Agricultural Hubs in Germany. Policy Studies Journal. doi:10.1111/psj.12377. Winkel, G., & Leipold, S. (2016). Demolishing Dikes: Multiple Streams and Policy Discourse Analysis. Policy Studies Journal, 44(1), 108-129. Zahariadis, N. (2016). Delphic Oracles: Ambiguity, Institutions, and Multiple Streams. Policy Sciences, 49(1), 3-12. Zohlnhöfer, R., Herweg, N., & Huß, C. (2015). Bringing Formal Political Institutions into the Multiple Streams Framework: An Analytical Proposal for Comparative Policy Analysis. Journal of Comparative Policy Analysis: Research and Practice, 18(3), 243-256. Suggested Panel Political Institutions and the Multiple Streams Framework