How to Attract Voter Attention? The Emergence of the Political Agenda and the Issue Management Model

Abstract

The large theoretical and empirical body of research on different rational choice concepts has provided a wide array of material for both critics and adherents of this approach. However, the ability rational choice theories offer to incorporate assumptions developed in different research areas in unitary logical concepts has been seldom highlighted. In order to demonstrate this ability, I have developed a model of the emergence of the political agenda, called the Issue Management Model, which tries to extend the Economic Theory of Democracy to the requirements of the modern media democracy and to connect its main assumptions with some concepts of shaping the political agenda from political psychology and media communication. The article pursues three objectives: first, it demonstrates the ability of the rational choice theories to link their key assumptions to empirical results of studies in different academic disciplines. Second, it discusses the extent to which the Economic Theory of Democracy can be aligned with the requirements of modern democracy. Last, it attempts to bring together several concepts of the emergence of the political agenda. The intention of this article is to contribute to a better understanding of the formation of political agenda or, strictly speaking, of the construction of party strategies aimed at surviving in office.