How anger and fear influence policy narratives: Advocacy and regulation of oil and gas drilling in Colorado

Abstract

When advocating for policy change, coalitions rely on various elements and strategies of policy narratives, including emotions. However, past research on the Narrative Policy Framework, and more broadly on the policy process, has largely ignored the role of emotions. This paper argues that emotions, such as anger and fear, are central to how coalitions advocate for policy change. It explores the role of anger and fear in policy narratives by examining the oral testimony (n = 474) given over four legislative committee hearings in March 2019 concerning Colorado Senate Bill 19‐181. This bill changed the mission of the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission to prioritize protecting the environment and public health over oil and gas development. This research finds the coalition that successfully supported the bill used anger towards the oil and gas industry, while those that opposed the bill relied more on fear of the uncertain consequences of the bill. It also finds the coalition that opposed the bill relied on self‐characterization as heroes and victims, which was a failed strategy. The implications for this research on the Narrative Policy Framework and, more broadly, for the policy process and advocacy are discussed.

Fracking Twitter: Utilizing machine learning and natural language processing tools for identifying coalition and causal narratives

“…Previously conducted analyses on only the 500 most influential users according to how often they tweeted about fracking in New York and the number of retweets were manually coded. Our previous work (Pattison et al., 2022) has been described as a fine‐grained analysis of the meso‐level use of the angel/devil‐shift mechanics and the emotions employed therein (Pierce et al., 2022). We believe the analysis presented here extends the development of ML methods into the broader literature of NPF applications.…”

Examining emotional belief expressions of advocacy coalitions in Arkansas' gender identity politics

“…In sum, this paper contributes to the many theories and approaches that now question and subsequently research emotions in policy processes (Durnová, 2019(Durnová, , 2022Fullerton et al, 2023;Gabehart et al, 2023;Pierce, 2021;Pierce et al, 2024;Verhoeven & Duyvendak, 2016;Verhoeven & Metze, 2022;Yordy et al, 2023;Zanocco et al, 2018). The goal is to advance the understanding of policy processes through a continued nisus of developing a more realistic and accurate model of the individual that is pivotal within many of our policy process theories.…”

“…Policy studies increasingly incorporate emotions in various ways to understand better a range of questions, from why people engage in policy to how people make sense of their world to how power or legitimacy manifests through emotions. For example, recent efforts include work in the narrative policy framework ( Jones, 2014;Pierce, 2021;Pierce et al, 2024;Zanocco et al, 2018), agenda setting (Merry & Mattingly, 2024), and the advocacy coalition framework (ACF) (Fullerton et al, 2023;Gabehart et al, 2023). Emotions have long been mentioned explicitly-though often in an underdeveloped way-or implicitly in the foundation of policy process theories.…”

Perception and performance in environmental policy

“…The NPF provides categories to analyze different strategies of the use of emotions to reach policy goals. Pierce et al (2024) do this by showing that in a specific hydraulic fracturing conflict both sides have used emotions: Opponents of fracking used anger and proponents of fracking (and opponents of the bill under study) used fear. Both emotions were combined with narrative elements.…”