Agenda setting was defined as "the process of the mass media presenting certain issues frequently and prominently with the result that large segments of the public one to perceive those issues as more important than others. Simply put, the more coverage an issue receives, the more important it is to people." (Coleman, McCombs, Shaw, Weaver, 2008).
The media alters the perception of an issue by the public by filtering certain things out and shaping the way in which the public can view that issue. As a result of the media focusing on only one or more issues, the public begin to see that that is the important issue, the one on which they too should focus and see as important.
So in some ways, this filtering and shaping is a form of censorship, in that the media is determining what we, the public, can view, connect too and deem as important.
Walter Lippman saw that agenda setting in the media was very influential in the form of propaganda. Mr. Lippman defined propaganda as "a tool to help shape images in the minds of human beings in support of an enterprise, idea or group".
Although being both important and influential in many situations, the ability for the media to use propaganda to shape how the public understand, connect and relate to issue has more effect for certain issues than it does for others.
Take war for example.
During both World Wars, media institutes used propaganda and agenda setting to portray the idea that war was the most important thing at that time. Everybody, even those who did not know anyone involved in the war, those who did not want to be involved in the war, those who just wanted to forget the war was even happening, needed to know about it.
In newspapers during that time, more often than not the front page was dedicated to the war and the war effort. Media institutes have the power to put whatever they want on the the front page. It was the war that was the most important.
However, in the case of the Vietnam War, the US governments use of propaganda to portray their involvement in the war as being a good thing, was not received by the public in perhaps the way it was planned for.
On this day in 1969, rioting and protests against the war in Vietnam were held on college campuses across California to the extent that National Guardsmen were called in to patrol the Berkley campus of the University of California with fixed bayonets, in order to keep the peace.
Agenda setting in the media can be used to shape the ideologies of certain people and create cultural groups as a result. Although the media would have wanted everyone to be in favour of the war effort, through the use of propaganda to shape the publics perception of it.
In saying that, the publics initial reaction to an issue can weigh quite heavily on whether or not an issue should be portrayed positively or negatively.
Agenda setting influences the public, the public influence agenda setting.
Image available: http://www.english-online.at/history/vietnam-war/vietnam-war-background.htm
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