commentary framing lobbying messages: defining and

Journal of Public Affairs/ Public Affairs 1: 269-280 (2007) ..•";, ®WILEYPublished online in Wiley InterScience "^^ I(www.interscience.wiley.com) DOI: 10.1002/pa.267 ^

Commentary

Framing lobbying messages: definingand communicating political issuespersuasivelyConor McGrath*Cuilin Mara, Seafort Terrace, Sandymount, Dublin 4, Republic oJ Ireland

• The concept of product positioning is well established in the commercial cotnmunicationsphere, as are the notions of issue dejinition and agenda setting in the field of politicalscience. Less thoroughly researched, though, is an area which intersects these two fields—the way in which lobbyists use language in order to frame policy issues so as to positiontheir organization and its policy preferences to greatest effect. Lobbyists consciously frameand define issues in an effort to encourage policy makers both to share the lobbyist'sperspective on a given policy problem, and to suggest to those policy makers what policysolution ought to be adopted. Ln doing so, they explicitly draw upon ideas and practicesmore commonly associated with other forms of commercial communication such asadvertising and marketing. This paper suggests that the use of language by lobbyists is apotentially fruitful field for both academics and practitioners interested in politicalcommunication broadly defined—indeed, lobbying is essentially a form of persuasivecommunication in the political arena. Lt is well understood that how political issues arepresented is an important factor in the extent to which an issue will be supported; thispaper focuses on how lobbyists make use of this understanding in their efforts to achieve adesired policy outcome.

Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Introduction in terms of the media and public opinion). One, ^ , , , , r topic, though, which intersects these two areas.

There is a wealth of research by now both from ^^ ^^^^ .^ ^^^^ ^ ^j^^ ^^^^^^.^ ,. ^^^the commercial communication sphere about ^^^^ ^j^ . . tremendously significant forthe value of product positioning, and from the practitioners-how lobbyists use languagepolitical science field about how the public ^^^,^^^^,1 ,^ f^ame policy issues in such apolicy agenda is set or established (particularly ^^^ ^ ^ ^^^^^ ^^^ organization and its

policy preferences to greatest effect. As Gerrity•Correspondence to: Conor McGrath, CuUin Mara, (2006) notes: 'A frame can assign blame,Snd '^'''^'"'' ^'"'''""°""'' °"''"" ' ' ' P"""' ° define a problem, point out the cause, or implyE-mail: [email protected] « solution'. Perhaps the most infiuential PR text

Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Journal of Puhlic Affairs, August 2007DOI: 10.1002/pa

270 Conor McGrath

yet written suggests that, 'lobbyists attempt tofocus attention on issues, facts, and appealsthat will lead to acceptance of their client'spoint of view' (Grunig and Hunt, 1984). Thispaper considers how lobbyists frame messagesin such a way as to achieve this focus.

In her work on child abuse. Nelson (1984)suggested that political agenda setting is theprocess, 'where those issues which wUlreceive governmental attention are chosenfrom among those issues which could receivegovernmental attention' (emphasis in theoriginal); increasingly, lobbyists and theirframing of policy issues are a significant factorin this process. A recent paper by a group ofAmerican academics posed the question, 'Whydo politicians, media gatekeepers and vastsegments of the population care about anddevote their energy and attention to somesocial problems but not others?' beforeconcluding that the 'answers tend to rest lesswith the objective characteristics of socialproblems themselves and more with thepower, resources and skills of those who seekto mold public sentiment about them'(Sahnon et al, 2003). Similarly, one study ofthe commimication techniques used by activistgroups suggests that:

Social advocates can infiuence the adoptionof policy positions by govemment. Socialmovement communication can impactpolicy, given appropriate social andpolitical opportunity afforded by context,indirectly, through affecting public opinionor accepted perceptual frameworksaround various issues, or more directly,through communication with policy-makers (McHale, 2004; emphasis added).

Framing issues in persuasivecommunications

A well-established principle underpinning muchcommercial communication (such as market-ing and advertising) suggests that effectivepositioning of a product is key to success. Thistends to involve associating the product in the

minds of consumers with desirable or favour-able attributes or connotations. A businessacademic asserts that, '"Ownership" of wordsor images in the minds of outside parties canrepresent a form of organizational capital'(Heugens, 2002)—for instance in terms ofbrand building or, as this paper suggests,lobbying. As one marketing book puts it:'Positioning is ... the process of designing animage and value so that customers within thetarget segment understand what the com-pany or brand stands for in relation to itscompetitors' (Wilson and Galligan, 2005).

Jobber and Fahy (2003) assert that effectivepositioning requires that the idea expressed bea simple and straightforward one—examplesabound, but a couple serve to illustrate thepoint: 'It is. Are you?" (The Independent news-paper in the UK), 'We try harder' (Avis rentalcars) and 'Because I'm worth if (L'Orealbeauty products). All these slogans say some-thing about the organization or product, in adirect and clear way. In essence, they help toclarify for the consumer what the product islike, and by doing so they hope to encouragethe consumer to identify with the product's'personality'. None of these slogans wouldwork commercially unless consumers feelconfident that the image matches up to thereality of the product.

In an early issue of this journal, an Americanacademic (Terry, 2001) explains the relevanceof framing to political lobbying through ananalysis of communication theory, in particularsymbolic convergence theory (SCT). Havingnoted that SCT holds that people seek toestablish a shared perception through the useof symbolic 'facts', she goes on to describehow lobbyists consciously employ storytellingin the course of their direct lobbying of policymakers. Focusing in particular upon what SCTterms 'fantasy themes' (which Terry (2001)defines as the 'messages contained within thedrama the stories teir\ she describes howlobbyists for Texan physicians built theirefforts around an overriding slogan, 'Phys-icians Caring For Texans'. This dominant framewas then used to redefine technical debatesabout medical liability into more persuasive

Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Journal of Public Affairs, August 2007DOL 10.1002/pa

Framing lobbying messages 271

terms relating to the quality of patient care —the Bill which emerged was titled the PatientProtection Act. This follows the advice givenby Mack (1997) who instructs that, 'Issuesshould be framed to show how the publicbenefits from your side of the argument.Don't go public with a narrow, self-servingissue'. The precise content and mode ofdelivery of organizational messages matter inlobbying, as in all other forms of persuasivecommunication. One public relations textbookemphasizes that:

Messages are often underestimated, butthey are vitally important and can't Just befiung together.... They are the point ofcontact between an organization andits publics in communication terms....Messages and the way they are conveyedare the starting point of the thinking,attitude or behavioral change that theorganization is seeking. Badly done, theycan be the end point too (Gregory, 2000).

According to one w riter, the process offraming an issue is essentially, 'to select someaspects of a perceived reality and make themmore salient in a communicating text,in such a way as to promote a particularproblem definition, causal interpretations,moral evaluation and/or treatment recom-mendations for the item described' (Entman,1993). Much the same meaning is expressed byWatkins et al. (2001) thus: 'Framing is the useof argument, analogy and metaphor tocreate a favourable definition of the problemto be solved and the set of acceptablesolutions'. These frames then form the basisof how a particular policy issue is viewed, andthus influence how that issue will be dealt withby policy makers: lobbyists (on all sides of anyissue) will attempt to frame or define the issuein such a way as to suggest that their particularperspective is the correct one. As one writerputs it, 'Alternative frames affect judgmentsby stressing specific considerations, makingcertain values or facts more accessible andgiving them relative importance', (Joslyn,2003). In their study of policy agendas in

American politics, Baumgartner and Jones(1993) note that:

Competing images may emerge from agiven set of conditions, especially whenpolicymakers believe that different policyoutcomes will follow from different under-standings of what the facts mean... Com-peting participants attempt to manipulatethem to suit their needs. Since a givenpolicy typically has many differentimplications, it can be linked with manycompeting images.... Political struggle,then, involves confiict over the definitionof policy images.

Public policy issues (the focus of lobbyingefforts) tend to be complex, involving an arrayof both factors and alternatives; framing is anattempt by lobbyists to set the boundaries ofdebate on a given issue. In a 'how-to' guide toWashington lobbying (Wittenberg and Witten-berg, 1989), the very first piece of adviceoffered is to, 'Define the issue. Naturally, yourissue is of overriding importance. But inorder to get on the agenda in Washington youmust make it understandable'. Similarly,another guide suggests that, 'Behind everyissue is a morass of detail and nuance thatmust be reduced to a central theme leading toone unyielding conclusion: support for yourinitiative is the right choice' (Wolpe andLevine, 1996). So, for instance, Rosenthal(2001) notes that, 'In the battle over restrict-ing smoking in public places, the proponentsof the ban referred to the bill as 'The CleanIndoor Air Bill', while the opponents called it'The Smoking Restriction Bill". In a similarvein, one practitioner notes the importance of'using exactly the right words to name orposition the issue' Qaques, 2004), and givesthe example of the way in which activists onboth sides of the abortion debate have chosento label themselves either 'pro-choice' or'pro-life', rather than 'pro-abortion' or 'anti-abortion'. Indeed, abortion policy has longbeen a forum in which interest groups arekeenly aware of the value of framing—Gold-man (2006) asserts that the fundamental shift

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272 Conor McGrath

towards abortion reform in the United Statescame in the late 1960s as a result of the issuebecoming framed as a human right rather than,as it had been until then, being centred aroundarguments to do with the health or welfare ofthe pregnant woman.

David Rehr—then the President of theNational Beer Wholesalers Association(NBWA) in Washington—has told the authorthat positioning an issue:

is the idea of thinking through in fifteenwords or less why someone would want tobe for it. You don't have to get complicated.I always like to bounce my ideas offsomeone who knows nothing about mybusiness and see if they can get it.If the average person gets it then I thinkthe average Member of Congress or theaverage media person probably gets it too.But I don't think enough people spendenough time thinking about positioningthe issue.

Similarly, the campaigning organizationFriends of the Earth advises its members aboutthe importance of conciseness: 'Try to writedown the basics of your message in one ortwo short sentences. It will help strip away allthe secondary details about the issue you areworking on and arrive at something snappythat will grab attention in the shortestpossible time' (Gilligan and Watson, 2000).An Irish lobbyist agrees that the way in w hichan issue is framed or defined is key to alobbying campaign's effectiveness: 'Complexarguments, scientific formula and so on,should generally be avoided. If an argumentcan be encapsulated into a simple phrase orslogan, so much the better. If that phrase isemotional in character, even better again'(Tiemey, 2002).

Another example of the way in whichlobbyists consciously think about how amessage can be formulated and delivered isgiven by a Washington consultant who told theauthor:

How this relates to lobbying can be seen bylooking at an example. For instance, thePresident's decision to impose tariffs onsteel imported into the United States. Thelargest US steel manufacturers were ada-mant that these tariffs be set at 40% andnot the 30% that was being proposed.... Weneed somebody who can talk—not abouta steel tariff, because that is a badmessage—but rather we want to talkabout a good message, which is the illegalbehavior of foreign steel companies.We need to make this about punishingthe illegal behavior of foreign steel com-panies. The positioning on this issue has tobe pro-American, pro-US Jobs, pro-USindustry. So we visit every major news-paper in the country and outline in greatdetail the illegal behavior of foreign steelcompanies. Stories are best told in the USmedia by anecdote, so that people cangrasp the issues. Our favorite was thatKorean steel manufacturers were sendingbarges over to Seattle, picking up scrapmetal, paying for it, shipping it back toKorea, turning it into finished steel pro-ducts, importing it back into the US andselling it for less than they paid for thescrap metal. There is no way that that canbe profitable. Somebody is subsidizingthem somewhere along the line. Ourmessage then becomes that they need tobe punished; that steel has got to be taxedwhen it comes back into the United Statesbecause they are protecting jobs in Koreaby dumping steel in the United States.

The classic account of how organizations canframe their messages to best competitive effectremains the book by Al Ries and Jack Trout,Positioning: The Battle For Your Mind, firstpublished in 1981. One of the core elements oftheir advice is to focus on how your communi-cations are received:' You have to sharpen yourmessage to cut into the mind. You have toJettison the ambiguities, simplify the message,and then simplify it some more if you want along-lasting impression' (Ries and Trout, 2001).



The NBWA's David Rehr has asserted to theauthor that this book by Ries and Trout, 'was thebasis for this whole {lobbying/ strategy we puttogether'. As one marketing textbook suggests,Ries and Trout, 'who in the eyes of many are thefounding fathers of positioning theory, arguethat positioning is first and foremost acommunication strategy' (WUson and Galligan,2005). It is therefore useful at this point toreview the extent to which political lobbyingcan be considered as a form of communication,before moving on to explore how lobbyistsframe issues and position the organizationswhich they represent.

Lobbying as a form of politicalcommunication

One of the most infiuential and frequentlycited definitions of lobbying is that offered byMilbraith (1963) who asserted that: 'lobbyingis the stimulation and transmission of acommunication, by someone other than acitizen acting on his own behalf, directed toa governmental decision-maker with thehope of infiuencing his decision'. In thewords of an Austrian lobbyist, 'lobbying isgenerally defined as a comtnunication instru-ment especially targeted to political decision-making authorities' (Koeppl, 2001). AndWilson (1973) has gone so far as to state that:'It is now well understood that what anorganizational representative does infurthering his group's interests before gov-emment has more to do with his manage-ment of a communications system, than withhis exercise of infiuence'.

If lobbying is intimately concerned withcommunication as these writers suggest, wewould expect that lobbyists themselves paycareful attention to the language and forms ofwords that they use in their communicationwith policy makers. So, for instance, AnneWexler (a Washington consultant) has told theauthor that: 'the people who are good atlobbying are those who are good at findingways to tell their story most effectively.Communication and communication tools

overlay virtually every lobbying opportunity'.Similarly, Howard Marlowe (a former Presidentof the American League of Lobbyists) has toldthe author that, 'In presenting a clients case,our approach is one that I call "advocacyjournalism". We want to present the essentialfacts with an appropriate spin which empha-sizes the strengths of our client's position'. ALondon-based lobbyist, Michael Burrell,described to the author how particular wordscan help to frame a lobbying campaign:

/ had a client once who made audio tapemachines and tapes. For reasons to do withartists' copyright the British govemmentproposed to put a levy on the sale of blankaudio tape, so every time you bought someblank audio tape it would cost morebecause there would be this levy whichwould be used to re-distribute money tomusicians.... We decided that what thegovemment was proposing was not a'levy', it was a 'tax', and we launched acampaign against this tax.

Michael Fulton, a Washington lobbyist hastold the author how crafting the preciselanguage used in lobbying messages can beundertaken in practice:

We will engage in developing messages toachieve what the client wants to do.... Thenwe like to test those messages in someformat. If Congress is our end audience,we can go see some of our friends up onCapitol Hill and say, 'How does this strikeyou? Are you aware of this issue? Are yougetting any mail on it? What would youthink if the company did A, B or C?'We bring this feedback back to the officeand it gives us a read of what people thinkon Capitol Hill. Sometimes we developscenario videos that simulate an issue, andsay, 'What did you think of thaf' Then wewill them our client's side of things throughanother simulated video and say, 'Afterwatching this does it change your mind?Does it give you the other side of the issuein a way that you understand it?' We try to


274 Conor McGrath

see if that turns them around or moves theneedle at all. If it does not then we need togo back to the drawing board a little bit;if it does then we will implement it.

One lens through which the communicativeelement of lobbying can be explored lies in thefield of political marketing. Political marketinghas become an increasingly popular area foracademic research over the last decade in boththe USA and UK. However, study of therelationship between political marketing andlobbying is a relatively small sub-set of thisgeneral field. A lengthy review of the politicalmarketing literature by ScammeU (1999), forinstance, makes no direct mention of interestgroups. As Hards (1999) has remarked: 'Theimpact of corporate lobbying as a form ofmarketing communication is largely unre-searched and this is rarely mentioned in theliterature.' Moreover, searching through therelatively small amount of political marketingliterature on lobbying reveals that even thatwork tends to focus on questions around therecruitment and retention of members and theprovision of benefits to members by groups.Relatively little research has been undertakento date on how political marketing theory canexplain or illustrate the representation ofinterests by lobbyists or their policy-infiuencing activities.

One writer asserts that, 'Government rela-tions is, in a sense, a specialized form ofmarketing. In that same sense, direct lobby-ing is often face-to-face selling' (Mack, 1997)-An American writer described lobbying interms of its similarities to marketing thus:'Organizing support for a position on anissue is similar to planning a marketingcampaign. Selling the policy issue in thegovemment marketplace is parallel to sellinga product or service. It is essential to plan,package, and present the issue to convincethe decision maker, often a legislator or agovemment policymaker' (Fraser, 1982). Andsome lobbyists themselves recognize theconnection here—for instance, David Rehr,then the President of the NBWA in America,has told the author that he sees a direct

connection between marketing and lobbying:'Basically we are marketing and selling aproduct, it is a Bill, or a regulatory regula-tion, or something that we want from thegovemment, or something that we want thegovemment not to do to us'.

In a paper which undoubtedly helped tostimulate the academic thinking which laterdeveloped as political marketing, Kotler andLevy (1969) observed that marketing involvesmore than simple, direct, transactions of goodsor services; rather, it is concerned with themore general (even sometimes indirect andintangible) exchange of commodities (includ-ing ideas). How this relates to lobbying isillustrated by Jaatinen (1999) who asserts that:'The first condition of democratic lobbying isthat its main characteristic is infonnationexchange' (emphasis in the original). As twoAmerican observers of lobbying put it, 'Thepublic-affairs profession is engaged in thedevelopment, creation, packaging and mar-keting of ideas and opinions, rather thanproducts or services' (Berkowitz and Feulner,1996). It is this notion that ideas can bemarketed which underpins an examination ofhow lobbyists market their policy preferences.

Branding as a lobbying tool

The importance for a lobbying organization ofbranding itself is effectively illustrated by DavidRehr, then President of the NBWA. He firmlybelieves in the importance of being able to usea single logo and strap line in all of NBWA'scommunications—ifRepresentatives and Sena-tors already have a mental impression of anorganization before being approached by thatgroup on any particular issue, they will be morelikely to absorb the message being delivered.The slogan Rehr devised for NBWA—'FamilyBusinesses Distributing America's Beverage' —not only defines the fundamental point aboutbeer wholesalers in a way which is easilymentally retained, but also has the effect ofprotecting NBWA's policy interests:

It's tough to be against family businesses inAmerica, and when you say beer is



America's beverage, it is a lot tougher to beagainst beer. We stay away from the word'alcohol'. That is a negative word in publicopinion. 'Beer' is a positive word so we talkabout beer. Moreover, NBWA members areall small business people so we emphasizethe small business aspect.

Rehr's general philosophy provides a sense ofunity and coherence to all NBWA's detailedstatements and positions. The consistency of thissimple 'bottom line' self-image underpins theassociation's entire govemment affairs strategy.

Lobbying organizations often go to somelengths to devise a title which frames them-selves and their issues in the best possible light(Mayer, 2007). A report by the Washington-based Advocacy Institute (1995) noted someexamples, including: the Coalition for HealthInsurance Choices, which purported to be abody representing consumers, but was actuallyfunded by the health insurance companies; thegroup representing pesticide manufacturerschanged its name from the National Agricul-tural Chemicals Association to the morepositive-sounding American Crop ProtectionAssociation; Citizens for Sensible Control ofAcid Rain, which was established by energyutility companies in an effort to defeatproposals to curb acid rain; and the Alliancefor Energy Security, which was really a creationof the Natural Gas Suppliers Association in itscampaign to lobby for deregulation of theindustry. One example—which received con-siderable publicity at the time—was when thegovemment of Kuwait paid millions of dollarsto a Washington PR and lobbying firm in 1990to provide political and public support forAmerica to launch the first Gulf War againstSaddam Hussein; the company's client wasofficially listed, not as the government ofKuwait, but rather as an apparently indepen-dent group called Citizens for a Free Kuwait. Asone w riter put it:

Very little money, of course, was going tocome from either Kuwaiti or Americancitizens, and the adjective 'free' was some-thing of a stretch in describing a country

where there was no religious freedom,women had few rights, dissidents werearrested without trial and tortured, and allthe power resided in a monarchical familyheaded by an Emir with literally dozens ofwives (Trento, 1992).

One of the most insightful American satir-ists, Christopher Buckley, tumed his gazetowards lobbying in a 1994 novel. ThankYou For Smoking. In this novel, Nick Naylor isthe lobbyist and chief spokesman of theAcademy of Tobacco Studies—despite itsacademic/scientific name, the Academy isthe trade association representing the majorcigarette companies. Naylor, whose role asdefender of the tobacco industry inevitablymakes him one of the most harried andpressured lobbyists in Washington, lunchesregularly with two friends who are lobbyistsfor other products frowned upon by the liberalconsensus: Bobby Jay Bliss, a pro-gun advocatewho works at, 'SAFETY, the Society forthe Advancement of Firearms and EffectiveTraining of Youth, formerly NRBAC, theNational Right to Bear Arms Committee'(Buckley, 1994); and Polly Bailey, the chiefspokesperson for the Moderation Council,'formerly the National Association for Alco-holic Beverages, [which] represented thenation's distilled spirits, wine and beerindustries' (Buckley, 1994).

While this fiction points to how organiz-ations can use titles and language to mask theirtrue intent, there is nothing inherently orabsolutely wrong in a lobbying group attempt-ing to use an organizational title whichaccurately refiects the group's concerns. Thelegitimate importance of an organization'sname as a vay of framing and defining itspolicy issues is well illustrated by Mike Beard,who runs the Washington-based Coalition toStop Gun Violence. He told the author that:

We started out our life originally as theNational Coalition to Ban Handguns—wewanted to eliminate them altogether—butthat tumed out to be neither a verypolitically- nor policy-wise position to take.


276 Conor McGrath

so we changed the name to the Coalition toStop Gun Violence. More recent researchhas shown that we can significantly reducegun violence through a series of less drasticpolicy changes. We still say that we supportbanning handguns and assault weapons,but right now our major goals arelicensing, registration and universal back-ground checks.

Clearly, these two alternative names for theorganization define it in very different ways,with consequent differences in terms of itspolicy agenda. Similarly, Heaney (2006) refersto the identity confusion faced by the HealthIndustry Manufacturers Association (^Thewords "industry" and "manufacturers"in the organization's name conjured imagesof heavy equipment and large warehouses',despite the fact that its membership includedfirms at the cutting edge of medical equip-ment) until it changed its title to AdvaMed: TheAdvanced Medical Technology Association.The titles of legislative measures can also beimportant in lobbying efforts, as one Americanscholar notes:

One way lobbyists get their points across isby labeling. What a bill is titled can matterenormously. One contract lobbyist recalledthat he could not get occupational thera-pists the licensing bill they wanted. The titleof their bill would have aroused everydoctor in the state. 'They can have whatthey want', he explained, 'if they Just call itsomething different'. That way, therewould be little opposition at all (Rosenthal,2001).

Framing lobbying tnessages

One recent policy issue which has been a focusof the NBWA (and, indeed, of many otherlobbying organizations) in America was repealof the estate tax, under which propertyinherited upon death is taxed. This wassignificant for the NBWA because when a

beer wholesaler died, his or her company waspassed on to family members, but was subjectto estate tax. Often, this meant that part or allof the business had to be sold in order to paythe estate tax. This legislative campaignillustrates the importance attached by theNBWA to framing issues in language whichmakes it easier for the public and legislators tosupport the association's position. Originally,the NBWA (and other small business groups)referred to the issue as the 'estate tax', butfound that this generated little interest amongthe American public (most of whom did notsee themselves as being wealthy enough tohave an 'estate'); and so it began talking about'inheritance tax', equally unsuccessfully. Morerecently, NBWA has campaigned to abolish the'death tax', as this was felt to have moreresonance with the public and legislators alike.This illustrates, in perhaps the most literalform, advice on framing given by one observerof lobbying in America: 'If a moral principle isat stake (e.g. discrimination or injustice^lead with it. Citizens understand that if it canhappen to you, it could happen to them'(Mack, 1997). In this case, the lobbyingmessage had to be repeatedly redefined untilpeople understood that they would one day diejust as beer wholesalers die.

An important reason why lobbyists take careto construct the most advantageous issueframes is that the frame itself can define notonly the problem but also the solution. So, forinstance, during the 1995 dispute betweenGreenpeace and Shell Oil over whether Shellshould be allowed to dump the Brent Spar oilplatform in the North Atlantic, one of Green-peace's key messages was to question why thisought to be acceptable when 'no one has beenable to dump their rusty old car in the localpond for more than 30 years' (cited inWatkins et al., 2001)—this frame won signifi-cant media and public support for not just theidentification of the problem but also thesolution (i.e. that Shell should have to take thecostlier route of dismantling the structure anddisposing of it elsewhere). As one Washingtonconsultant put it to the author: 'Congress



actually passes relatively little legislation,so unless you are the front page topic of theweek, it is difficult to persuade Congress thatthis is the week to act on your concerns. Youhave to package the program, whatever theproblem is and the solution'. Another has toldthe author that:

/ think one of the things that we do betterthan anybody in this town is, at the start ofa project, giving really sound strategicadvice on the way in which the issue isframed—the issue message and thesolution message in other words. I thinkthat one of the ways in which we try tobring value to clients is by helping themframe the debate in a way that is going tomaximize the likelihood of success.

A group of American academics illustratethis point when they argue (Salmon et al.,2003) that 'defining a social problem ofviolence in society in terms of violent contentin films and TV programs automaticallydefines its solution: regulation of mediacontent'. In a similar vein, Edelman (1977)suggests that a road safety public awarenesscampaign which encourages motorists to drivesafely will tend to ignore other relevant factorssuch as poor design and manufacturing by carcompanies, high official speed limits, danger-ous road construction and so on. He notes that:'Whether or not a "drive safely" campaignmakes drivers more careful, it creates anassumption about what the problem is andwho is responsible for it that can only bepartially valid.... This form of cognition ishelpful to car manufacturers and to thehighway lobby'.

An Irish lobbyist has suggested that: 'Politicallanguage works best, when it is emotivelyappealing and logically compelling. It mustwin both the hearts and the minds of theelectorate' (Tiemey, 2002). A good example ofhow he applied this in practice is given in a casestudy of a lobbying campaign organized inIreland in the 1980s—briefly, the Irish Restau-rant Owners' Association had been attempting

for 15 years to persuade successive govem-ments to permit restaurants to serve Irish beerand spirits with meals (they were allowed to sellwine, but no wine was produced in Ireland, soall alcohol sold in restaurants was imported).Myles Tiemey, a Dublin lobbyist, was commis-sioned to take on this case, and within two yearsthe law had been changed. The focal point ofhis lobbying efforts was a slogan, used on arange of literature (briefing papers, posters,beer, mats): 'Sorry, no Irish served here'.Recalling the history of racial discriminationoften suffered in the past by Irish immigrants,this phrase captured the imagination of thepublic and policy makers alike, and indicated anirrational flaw in legislation. Harboume (1995)quotes Tiemey as saying that as soon as thisslogan was devised, 'I knew we had won. It wasa lovely slogan. It powerfully demonstrated anobvious inequality'. A Bmssels-based consult-ant argues that lobbyists in the EU, 'must learnhow to balance rational arguments withemoUonally appealing messages' (Titley,2003). This point is also made in the marketingliterature: for instance, Wilson and Gilligan(2005) note that the breakfast cereal Special Kprovides consumers with both a 'functionalpurpose' (i.e. 'Helps you to look good byhelping you to manage your weight andshape'^ and an 'emotional promise' (i.e. 'Theally who helps you to feel good aboutyourself'^.

A recent paper suggests how lobbyists ondifferent sides of an issue can use framing as away of defining it and providing a messagewhich is difficult to oppose:

For example, one advocacy group mightlabel a social practice as 'female circumci-sion', while another might label the samepractice as 'female genital mutilation'. Eachgroup would attempt to get the media touse its terminology, thereby putting itsopponent at a substantial disadvantage insubsequent policy debates. It is one thing todefend female circumcision as a culturalor religious practice, but quite another todefend mutilation; conversely, it is one


278 Conor McGratb

thing to oppose mutilation, but quiteanother to oppose long-standing culturaland religious rites (Salmon et al, 2003).

A similar example is given by Leech et al.who discuss American legislation to exemptthe sale of products over the Internet fromsales taxes: the Bill's proponents argued thatintroducing such taxes would stifle thecommercial growth and innovation of theIntemet; while its opponents asserted that toleave Intemet sales tax-exempt put traditionalretailers—who did have to pass on sales taxesto their customers—at a competitive disad-vantage, and moreover resulted in lost revenueand hence reduced services for state and localgovemment. One of the anti-tax lobbyists isquoted in Leech et al. (2002) as saying that,'the other side has succeeded in refranting thedebate away from taxpayer rights to govem-ment revenue and fairness issues'.

Lobbyists themselves recognize (even ifgrudgingly) when their opponents are particu-larly effective in terms of framing the policyissue which they contest. A good example isprovided by Mike Beard of the US Coalition toStop Gun Violence, who told the author that:

Most of the people who send money to myorganization will say, 7 think we shouldban handguns, but of course it's uncon-stitutional'. The Second Amendment is nota problem in terms of what it says; it's aproblem in terms of what people think itsays.... The entire wording of the SecondAmendment states: 'A well-regulated mili-tia, being necessary to the security of a freestate, the right of the people to keep andbear arms shall not be infringed'. TheNational Rifle Association quotes thesecond half, they just simply talk aboutthe right of the people to keep arms; theynever talk about the first half of the SecondAmendment. I think if we were just facingthe amount of money the NRA have thenwe could beat them, but we can't beat themin this belief that the gun is somehowprotected by the Constitution of the UnitedStates.

Coficlusiofi

The language with which any policy issue isframed can undoubtedly influence both how itis perceived and then how it is decided. AsLeech etal. (2002) note: 'The ways legislatorsand the public think about an issue can be apowerful force in determining how they willact. Thinking about a different aspect of acomplex issue can lead people to change theirminds'. What lobbyists seek to do when theyframe an issue is to find a form of words whichexpresses the policy problem as they see it andsuggests the policy solution which they desire.Having analysed a number of successfullobbying campaigns which employed effectiveissue-framing, Watkins etal. (2001) concludedthat, 'By capturing the essence of theirarguments in memorable, evocative catchphrases, skilful players were able to shapepublic opinion and hence bring pressure tobear on rule makers'.

Lobbyists are consciously employing tech-niques of positioning and branding morecommonly associated with the flelds ofadvertising and marketing. They do so pre-cisely because they appreciate that at its heartlobbying is also an exercise in persuasivecommunication. As such, the attempt bylobbyists to frame policy issues and definepolicy solutions represents an importantcomponent of the process by which policy-makers approach complex issues. Key to thisattempt is an understanding of how to mosteffectively communicate lobbying messages.Further academic study of the precise nature oflobbying communications could yield valuableinsights. As one writer suggests: 'Both theor-etically and in practice, understanding whatlobbyists do symbolically, how they do itrhetorically, and who they are in terms ofhuman communicators can contribute pro-ductively to the work of communicationscholars and professionals alike' (Terry,2001). In a similar vein, Jaatinen (1999) arguesthat, 'Lobbying can be made more sophisti-cated only if more knowledge is generatedfrom studying it as communication. Com-munications theory sheds light on questions

Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd, Journal of Public Affairs, August 2007DOI: 10,1002/pa

Fratning lobbying messages 279

such as effectiveness of efforts to influenceand the nature of interaction betweengroups'.

A number of areas for further research seempotentially fruitful: can insights from otherforms of commercial communication such asadvertising and marketing help to explainother facets of lobbying as well as framing?What lessons could be revealed if politicalmarketing theory was used to analyse lobbyingbehaviour in a variety of settings and contexts?Do we understand lobbying more fully byexamining it as primarily a form of corporatecommunication rather than in the moretraditional mode of political science research?Can we develop and then test formal hypoth-eses about when and why lobbyists are mostlikely to focus on language as a way of framingtheir messages? How successful are interestgroups at persuading policy makers to acceptand adopt a preferred frame?

Biographicat notes

Conor McGrath is now an Independent Scho-lar and w as Lecturer in Political Lobbying andPublic Affairs at the University of Ulster inNorthem Ireland from 1999 to 2006. Beforebecoming an academic, he previously workedfor a Conservative Member of Parliament in theUK and for a Republican Congressman as Pub-lic Affairs Director at a public relations com-pany, and as a self-employed lobbyist. Hisrecent publications include Lobbying inWashington, London and Brussels: The Per-suasive Communication of PoUtical Issues(Edwin Mellen Press 2005); 'The Ideal Lobby-ist: Personal Characteristics of Effective Lobby-ists' (Journal of Communication Management,2006) and 'Lobbying and Public Trust', in TomSpencer and Conor McGrath (eds). Challengeand Response: Essays on Public Affairs andTransparency (Landmarks 2006). His cvirrentareas of research include the role of organizationswhich represent lobbyists, legislators with priorlobbying experience and popular perceptions oflobbying.

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