Elite Framing and Agenda-Setting of Morality Issues: An Experiment in Turkey

• In Event: Comparative Research on Elite Media Strategies in Authoritarian Contexts

Abstract

In competitive authoritarian contexts, party leaders often politicize morality issues. Morality policy refers to issues such as religious education, abortion access, and same-sex marriage which “provoke fierce debates over the ‘right way’ of living” (Euchner 2019: 1). This paper presents the results of two experiments in Turkey that address two related questions: how do political actors shape public opinion on morality policy?; what are the strategic incentives for political actors to politicize some morality policies and not others? These online survey experiments test the notion that political leaders’ framing and agenda-setting of issues affect mass support for the government especially in moments of economic crisis. The first experiment hypothesizes that restrictive framings of issues drawing upon Islamic and religious nationalist argumentation can sway swing voters to pro-government policies relative to control. The second experiment hypothesizes that morality policy issues such as the withdrawal from the Istanbul Convention or conversion of the Hagia Sophia into a mosque can shift public attention away from poor economic conditions in the country.

Author

• Daniel Joseph Schulte, Brown University