Policy congruence and advocacy strategies in the discourse networks of minimum unit pricing for alcohol and the soft drinks industry levy.

BACKGROUND AND AIM: Public health policy development is subject to a range of stakeholders presenting their arguments to influence opinion on the best options for policy action. This paper compares stakeholders' positions in the discourse networks of two pricing policy debates in the United Kingdom: minimum unit pricing for alcohol (MUP) and the soft drinks industry levy (SDIL). DESIGN: Discourse analysis was combined with network visualization to create representations of stakeholders' positions across the two policy debates as they were represented in 11 national UK newspapers. SETTING: United Kingdom. OBSERVATIONS: For the MUP debate 1924 statements by 152 people from 87 organizations were coded from 348 articles. For the SDIL debate 3883 statements by 214 people from 175 organizations were coded from 511 articles. MEASUREMENTS: Network analysis techniques were used to identify robust argumentative similarities and maximize the identification of network structures. Network measures of size, connectedness and cohesion were used to compare discourse networks. FINDINGS: The networks for both pricing debates involve a similar range of stakeholder types and form clusters representing policy discourse coalitions. The SDIL network is larger than the MUP network, particularly the proponents' cluster, with more than three times as many stakeholders. Both networks have tight clusters of manufacturers, think-tanks and commercial analysts in the opponents' coalition. Public health stakeholders appear in both networks, but no health charity or advocacy group is common to both. CONCLUSION: A comparison of the discourse in the UK press during the policy development processes for minimum unit pricing for alcohol and the soft drinks industry levy suggests greater cross-sector collaboration among policy opponents than proponents.

A discourse network analysis of UK newspaper coverage of the "sugar tax" debate before and after the announcement of the Soft Drinks Industry Levy.

BACKGROUND: On 6th April 2018, the UK Government introduced the Soft Drinks Industry Levy (SDIL) as a mechanism designed to address increasing prevalence of obesity and associated ill health by reducing sugar consumption. Given that the successful introduction of upstream food and nutrition policies is a highly political enterprise involving multiple interested parties, understanding the complex network of stakeholders seeking to influence such policy decisions is imperative. METHODS: Media content analysis was used to build a dataset of relevant newspaper articles, which were analysed to identify stakeholder agreement or disagreement with defined concept statements. We used discourse network analysis to produce visual representations of the network of stakeholders and coalitions evident in the debate as it was presented in UK newspapers, in the lead up to and following the announcement of the Soft Drinks Industry Levy in the UK, from May 2015 to November 2016. RESULTS: Coding identified 3883 statements made by 214 individuals from 176 organisations, relating to 47 concepts. Network visualisations revealed a complex network of stakeholders with clear sceptical and supportive coalitions. Industry stakeholders appeared less united in the network than anticipated, particularly before the SDIL announcement. Some key industry actors appeared in the supportive coalition, possibly due to the use of corporate social responsibility rhetoric. Jamie Oliver appeared as a dominant stakeholder, firmly embedded with public health advocates. CONCLUSION: This study highlights the complexity of the network of stakeholders involved in the public debate on food policies such as sugar tax and the SDIL. Polarisation of stakeholders arose from differences in ideology, focus on a specific policy and statements about the weight of evidence. Vocal celebrity policy entrepreneurs may be instrumental in gaining public and policy makers' support for future upstream regulation to promote population health, to facilitate alignment around a clear ideology.

Mapping discourse coalitions in the minimum unit pricing for alcohol debate: a discourse network analysis of UK newspaper coverage.

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: Minimum unit pricing (MUP) for alcohol was introduced in Scotland on 1 May 2018, and is now on the policy agenda in other devolved administrations and at Westminster. Previous research has explored the arguments deployed for and against MUP, but the congruence between actors in the MUP debate has not been sufficiently examined. This study identified and mapped the discourse coalitions that emerged in the UK MUP debate through an analysis of actors' use of arguments in media coverage of the policy debates. DESIGN: A sample of print media coverage of MUP was obtained from the LexisNexis newspaper database. The resulting sample was imported into discourse network analysis (DNA) software for coding and subsequent visualization of actor networks. SETTING: United Kingdom. OBSERVATIONS: A total of 348 articles from eight UK-wide and three Scottish newspapers from an 18-month period, ending in November 2012, were analysed. MEASUREMENTS: Actors' arguments were coded to generate structured data for conversion into a weighted actor network where ties represent similarities among actors in terms of arguments in support of or opposition to MUP. FINDINGS: Two polarized discourse coalitions, Opponents and Proponents of MUP, emerged in media coverage. The Proponents coalition consisted mainly of health advocacy groups, charities, political parties and academic institutions. In the Opponents coalition, the networks were formed of key alcohol manufacturers and economic think-tanks. While producer organizations were central to the Opponents coalition, some commercial actors were more favourable to MUP, highlighting divisions within the industry overall. CONCLUSIONS: Media coverage of minimum unit pricing (MUP) in Scotland from June 2011 to November 2012 showed alignment between the policy positions of (1) alcohol producers and think-tanks opposed to MUP; and (2) public health advocates and health charities in favour of the policy. Some alcohol industry actors were supportive of MUP indicating divisions among the industry. Discourse network analysis may be usefully applied to study other highly contested policy issues in health and beyond.

Collaboration patterns in the German political science co-authorship network.

Research on social processes in the production of scientific output suggests that the collective research agenda of a discipline is influenced by its structural features, such as "invisible colleges" or "groups of collaborators" as well as academic "stars" that are embedded in, or connect, these research groups. Based on an encompassing dataset that takes into account multiple publication types including journals and chapters in edited volumes, we analyze the complete co-authorship network of all 1,339 researchers in German political science. Through the use of consensus graph clustering techniques and descriptive centrality measures, we identify the ten largest research clusters, their research topics, and the most central researchers who act as bridges and connect these clusters. We also aggregate the findings at the level of research organizations and consider the inter-university co-authorship network. The findings indicate that German political science is structured by multiple overlapping research clusters with a dominance of the subfields of international relations, comparative politics and political sociology. A small set of well-connected universities takes leading roles in these informal research groups.

Do Narcissism and Emotional Intelligence Win Us Friends? Modeling Dynamics of Peer Popularity Using Inferential Network Analysis.

This research investigated effects of narcissism and emotional intelligence (EI) on popularity in social networks. In a longitudinal field study, we examined the dynamics of popularity in 15 peer groups in two waves ( N = 273). We measured narcissism, ability EI, and explicit and implicit self-esteem. In addition, we measured popularity at zero acquaintance and 3 months later. We analyzed the data using inferential network analysis (temporal exponential random graph modeling, TERGM) accounting for self-organizing network forces. People high in narcissism were popular, but increased less in popularity over time than people lower in narcissism. In contrast, emotionally intelligent people increased more in popularity over time than less emotionally intelligent people. The effects held when we controlled for explicit and implicit self-esteem. These results suggest that narcissism is rather disadvantageous and that EI is rather advantageous for long-term popularity.