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Since Rein and Schön developed their approach to policy framing analysis in the1990s, a range of approaches to policy framing have emerged to inform our understanding of policy processes. Prior attempts to illuminate the diversity of approaches to framing in public policy have largely "stayed in their lane," making distinctions in approaches within shared epistemic communities. The aim in this paper is to map different approaches to framing used in policy sciences journals, to articulate what each contributes to the understanding of the policy process, and to provide a heuristic to aid in deciding how to use the diverse approaches in framing analysis and to further the dialogue across different approaches. To develop the heuristic, we manually coded and analyzed 68 articles published between 1997 and 2018 using "frame" or "framing" in their title or abstract from four policy journals: Critical Policy Studies, Journal of European Public Policy, Policy Sciences, and Policy Studies Journal. We identified five approaches, which we label: sensemaking, discourse, contestation, explanatory and institutional. We have found that these approaches do not align with a simple binary between interpretive and positivist but show variation, particularly along the lines of aims, methodology and methods. In the discussion, we suggest that these five approaches raise four key questions that animate framing studies in policy analysis: (1) Do frames influence policies or are policies manifestations of framing? (2) What is the role of frame contestation in policy conflict? (3) How can the study of frames or framing reveal unheard voices? And (4) how do certain frames/framings become dominant? By introducing these questions, we offer a fresh way scholars might discuss frames and framing in the policy sciences across approaches, to highlight the distinct yet complementary ways they illuminate policy processes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As the world's largest fossil fuels exporter, Russia is one of the key countries for addressing global climate change. However, it has never demonstrated any significant ambitions to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. This paper applies ideational research methodology to identify the structural differences in economic, political, and social normative contexts between industrialized fossil fuel importing economies and Russia that lead to the fundamental gap in motivations driving decarbonization efforts. Russia is unlikely to replicate the approach to the green transition and climate policy instruments of energy-importing countries. In order to launch decarbonization in Russia, interested stakeholders need to frame climate policies in Russia differently. Specifically, the framing must address the priority of diversification as a means to adapting the national economy to a new green landscape, the combination of diverse channels for decarbonization, the promotion of energy-efficiency, closer attention to climate-related forest projects, and linkage of climate change with other environmental problems. Moreover, considering Russia's emissions as a part of the global economic system and shifting from a simplistic national focus on GHG emissions reduction would help coordinate policies through dialogue between exporters and importers of fossil fuel energy-intensive goods, which is essential for the global movement towards a net-zero future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the Australian Government's 'Universal Access' policy in the early childhood education sector. Using data from selected policy texts, and drawing on interpretive policy analysis, the paper specifically examines rationales underlying the Universal Access agenda and instruments put in place to operationalize it and problematizes the framing of the equity agenda. The findings show that economic, educational and social goals inform the policy initiative; and targeted funding, teacher professionalization and performance monitoring serve as instruments in the enactment of the initiatives. A closer analysis of the texts also reveals that the Universal Access agenda is characterized by discursive shifts in the framing of equity goals, issue-omissions, contradictions of agendas, and inconsistencies of categories of disadvantage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this research note, we propose to complement the analytical toolbox for framing analyses with the categories of Aristotelian rhetoric. As our case, we analyse the function of the use of evidence in frame building in the context of Swiss direct-democratic campaigns preceding votes on smoking bans. Based on rhetoric, a frame can be considered to contain three interrelated elements: (1) political arguments (logos), (2) cultural symbols (ethos), and (3) emotional appeal (pathos). By comparing evidence-based arguments with arguments that do not refer to evidence, the research note illustrates that backing arguments (logos) by evidence increases their trustworthiness (ethos) but not their emotional appeal (pathos). We consider the Aristotelian categories a fruitful tool to enlarge existing framing research with regard to the use of evidence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Arguments in the formulation, implementation and evaluation of biodiversity policy frame conservation in a range of ways and express interests that can be conflicting. Policy processes are cyclic and iterative by nature and as policies are constantly reformulated, argumentation has an important role at each policy stage. In this paper, we utilise the policy cycle model to shed light on biodiversity-related policy processes and the ways in which argumentation generates effects at different stages of these processes. The paper first draws on literature and the theory-driven assumptions are then illustrated with insights from four European case studies on different policy processes in which biodiversity conservation plays a role. The analysis shows that argumentation tends to evolve over the course of the policy cycle, and framing has a key role across the different policy stages. It is concluded that the ways in which arguments persist, accumulate, diffuse, and replace old arguments, should be the target of increased attention in policy analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although attention to the local level of integration policymaking has increased recently, thus far, very few studies have focused on vertical 'multi-level' relations between policy levels and the implications these have for integration policies. This article asks how and why different configurations of relations between national and local governments affect the governance of migrant integration. To what extent, and if so, why do vertical relations trigger frame alignment or rather divergence? Following an embedded dissimilar case study design, the analysis focuses on the UK and the Netherlands as two countries with dissimilar governance structures in the field of integration, and two cities within each country that are known for their different integration approaches: London (boroughs Tower Hamlets and Enfield) and Glasgow and Rotterdam and Amsterdam. The analysis shows that there are no top-down coordination mechanisms that create frame alignment as conceptualized in the idea of national models. Yet, frame alignment does take place in the UK in particular around ad hoc multi-level governance initiatives, while at the same time leaving significant space for adaptation of frames to local circumstances. In the Netherlands, the absence of such vertical relations leads to frame divergence or even decoupling, occasionally resulting in frame conflicts and contradictory policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the dynamics underpinning universal pre-kindergarten policy debates in California and Florida in light of theories of policy investment, policy change, and sustainability of policy reforms. Because the expansion of prekindergarten raises key considerations about the appropriate role of the state in education and educational socialization experiences for young children, and because these investments involve significant budgetary outlays, they trigger two logics: a policy investment logic that leverages the power of evidence-based arguments and instrumentally rational calculations about costs and benefits of early years investments; and a cultural logic that rests on societal and policymakers' views about and trust in the state vis-à-vis the family and market. Media analysis of public debates in California reveals that instrumentally rational arguments about the benefits of universal pre-k were trumped by arguments based on appeals to principled beliefs about appropriate levels of state involvement. It also finds that this policy area is particularly susceptible to challenges to the legitimacy of political leaders. These cases thus provide important insights into the kinds of complex political factors that go into getting and sustaining social policy investments over the long term. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The study of policy framing enables the investigation of how elites conceptualize policy issues. While the dominant investigative work on elite framing has been within the mass media, we demonstrate the utility of an elite framing approach in a political institution, the U.S. Congress. We argue for moving to a 'life-cycle' approach to policy framing that recognizes the evolution of elite framing attempts as implementation of a law deviates from its legislative intent, basing our approach out of the issue-attention cycle theory put forth by Downs (Public Interest 28:38-50, ). Framing efforts by policy advocates do not end after legislation has been enacted or policy changed. Elites who have been unsuccessful in achieving their policy aims continue to advocate for their preferred outcomes by altering their framing strategies. We demonstrate this by applying evolutionary factor analysis to investigate 10 Congressional committee hearings held between 1957 and 2006 pertaining to federal funding for the Garrison Diversion Unit in North Dakota. From the perspective of proponents of diverting water from the Missouri River, how the Congressional debate over the Unit progressed constituted policy regression. This is reflected in the evolution of elite framing over the period studied. Our analysis uncovers the emergence of four evolutionary frames. Initial frames emphasized the benefits to be derived from water diversion, while subsequent frames reflected a more defensive posture emphasizing the limited harm that water diversion would cause. This research demonstrates the consequences of legislative implementation delay for elite framing attempts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing on published materials from the Committee of Ministers, Assembly and expert working groups of the Council of Europe, this paper investigates the distinctive contribution made to the framing of women's rights over the last two decades by this regional organisation, which recent studies of the `Europeanisation' of public policies have largely neglected. Elements of congruence are identified between the major mobilising themes of second wave feminism and the Council's emphasis on protecting individual rights, and its sensitivity to the incompleteness and shortcomings of `actually existing' democratic institutions and practices. The relative openness of its agenda-setting processes is also underlined. The Council's flag ship policies for women are shown to have centred since the mid-1980s on a `politics of presence' frame and the (contested) concept of `parity democracy', and the tensions between these and the more recent turn to gender mainstreaming are explored. But the paper also points to the Council's role in diffusing into the E.U. governance arena women's claims to equal participation and presence in the policy process, and notes recent French and U.K. legislation as testifying to the continuing salience of these claims at the national level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]