IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/policy/v55y2022i4d10.1007_s11077-022-09479-x.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

‘Windows of opportunity’: exploring the relationship between social media and plastic policies during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Author

Listed:
  • Joanna Vince

    (University of Tasmania
    University of Tasmania)

  • Estelle Praet

    (University of York)

  • John Schofield

    (University of York)

  • Kathy Townsend

    (University of the Sunshine Coast)

Abstract

Plastic pollution has reached a crisis point due to ineffective waste management, an over-reliance on single-use plastic items and a lack of suitable plastic alternatives. The COVID-19 Pandemic has seen a dramatic increase in the use of single-use plastics including ‘COVID waste’ in the form of items specifically intended to help stop the spread of disease. Many governments have utilised COVID-19 as a window of opportunity to reverse, postpone or remove plastic policies off agendas ostensibly in order to ‘flatten the curve’ of COVID-19 cases. In this paper, we use novel methods of social media analysis relating to three regions (USA, Mexico and Australia) to suggest that health and hygiene were not the only reasons governments utilised this window of opportunity to change plastic policies. Beyond the influence of social media on the plastics agenda, our results highlight the potential of social media as a tool to analyse public reactions to government decisions that can be influenced by industry pressure and a broader political agenda, while not necessarily following responses to consumer behaviour.

Suggested Citation

  • Joanna Vince & Estelle Praet & John Schofield & Kathy Townsend, 2022. "‘Windows of opportunity’: exploring the relationship between social media and plastic policies during the COVID-19 Pandemic," Policy Sciences, Springer;Society of Policy Sciences, vol. 55(4), pages 737-753, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:policy:v:55:y:2022:i:4:d:10.1007_s11077-022-09479-x
    DOI: 10.1007/s11077-022-09479-x
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11077-022-09479-x
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11077-022-09479-x?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Barberá, Pablo & Casas, Andreu & Nagler, Jonathan & Egan, Patrick J. & Bonneau, Richard & Jost, John T. & Tucker, Joshua A., 2019. "Who Leads? Who Follows? Measuring Issue Attention and Agenda Setting by Legislators and the Mass Public Using Social Media Data," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 113(4), pages 883-901, November.
    2. Diego Sanjurjo, 2020. "Taking the multiple streams framework for a walk in Latin America," Policy Sciences, Springer;Society of Policy Sciences, vol. 53(1), pages 205-221, March.
    3. repec:cup:apsrev:v:113:y:2019:i:04:p:883-901_00 is not listed on IDEAS
    4. Birkland, Thomas A., 1998. "Focusing Events, Mobilization, and Agenda Setting," Journal of Public Policy, Cambridge University Press, vol. 18(1), pages 53-74, January.
    5. Patrycja Rozbicka & Florian Spohr, 2016. "Interest groups in multiple streams: specifying their involvement in the framework," Policy Sciences, Springer;Society of Policy Sciences, vol. 49(1), pages 55-69, March.
    6. Mark Rhinard, 2019. "The Crisisification of Policy‐making in the European Union," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 57(3), pages 616-633, May.
    7. Kris Hartley & Minh Khuong Vu, 2020. "Fighting fake news in the COVID-19 era: policy insights from an equilibrium model," Policy Sciences, Springer;Society of Policy Sciences, vol. 53(4), pages 735-758, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Enriqueta Aragonès & Clara Ponsatí, 2022. "Shocks to issue salience and electoral competition," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 23(1), pages 33-63, March.
    2. Enriqueta Aragonès & Clara Ponsatí, 2019. "Preference Shocks that Destroy Party Systems," Working Papers 1118, Barcelona School of Economics.
    3. Usman W Chohan, 2022. "The return of Keynesianism? Exploring path dependency and ideational change in post-covid fiscal policy [Racial, economic, and health inequality and COVID-19 infection in the United States]," Policy and Society, Darryl S. Jarvis and M. Ramesh, vol. 41(1), pages 68-82.
    4. Tobin Im & Kris Hartley, 2019. "Aligning Needs and Capacities to Boost Government Competitiveness," Public Organization Review, Springer, vol. 19(1), pages 119-137, March.
    5. Benoit Aubert & Jane Li & Markus Luczak-Roesch & Thierry Warin, 2021. "La détermination des agendas de discussion par les médias sociaux," CIRANO Project Reports 2021rp-12, CIRANO.
    6. Abigail Sullivan & Dave D. White & Kelli L. Larson & Amber Wutich, 2017. "Towards Water Sensitive Cities in the Colorado River Basin: A Comparative Historical Analysis to Inform Future Urban Water Sustainability Transitions," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(5), pages 1-27, May.
    7. Massimiliano Scopelliti & Maria Giuseppina Pacilli & Antonio Aquino, 2021. "TV News and COVID-19: Media Influence on Healthy Behavior in Public Spaces," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(4), pages 1-15, February.
    8. Henrik Haller & Anna-Sara Fagerholm & Peter Carlsson & Wilhelm Skoglund & Paul van den Brink & Itai Danielski & Kristina Brink & Murat Mirata & Oskar Englund, 2022. "Towards a Resilient and Resource-Efficient Local Food System Based on Industrial Symbiosis in Härnösand: A Swedish Case Study," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(4), pages 1-17, February.
    9. Zhang, Han, 2021. "How Using Machine Learning Classification as a Variable in Regression Leads to Attenuation Bias and What to Do About It," SocArXiv 453jk, Center for Open Science.
    10. Jetter, Michael & Molina, Teresa, 2022. "Persuasive agenda-setting: Rodrigo Duterte’s inauguration speech and drugs in the Philippines," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 156(C).
    11. Xia, Huosong & Wang, Yuan & Zhang, Justin Zuopeng & Zheng, Leven J. & Kamal, Muhammad Mustafa & Arya, Varsha, 2023. "COVID-19 fake news detection: A hybrid CNN-BiLSTM-AM model," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 195(C).
    12. Mitja Vrdelja & Sanja Vrbovšek & Vito Klopčič & Kevin Dadaczynski & Orkan Okan, 2021. "Facing the Growing COVID-19 Infodemic: Digital Health Literacy and Information-Seeking Behaviour of University Students in Slovenia," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(16), pages 1-16, August.
    13. Neomi Frisch-Aviram & Nissim Cohen & Itai Beeri, 2018. "Low-level bureaucrats, local government regimes and policy entrepreneurship," Policy Sciences, Springer;Society of Policy Sciences, vol. 51(1), pages 39-57, March.
    14. Joshua Alley, 2023. "Elite Cues and Public Attitudes Towards Military Alliances," Journal of Conflict Resolution, Peace Science Society (International), vol. 67(7-8), pages 1537-1563, August.
    15. Ronnie Das & Wasim Ahmed, 2022. "Rethinking Fake News: Disinformation and Ideology during the time of COVID-19 Global Pandemic," IIM Kozhikode Society & Management Review, , vol. 11(1), pages 146-159, January.
    16. Koch, Svea & Friesen, Ina & Keijzer, Niels, 2021. "EU development policy as a crisis-response tool? Prospects and challenges for linking the EU's COVID-19 response to the green transition," IDOS Discussion Papers 27/2021, German Institute of Development and Sustainability (IDOS).
    17. Joanna Stryjek, 2021. "Counteracting the COVID-19 Crisis with Innovation Policy Tools: A Case Study of the EU’s Supranational Innovation Policy," European Research Studies Journal, European Research Studies Journal, vol. 0(3), pages 450-468.
    18. Müller-Hansen, Finn & Lee, Yuan Ting & Callaghan, Max & Jankin, Slava & Minx, Jan C., 2022. "The German coal debate on Twitter: Reactions to a corporate policy process," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 169(C).
    19. Brázová Věra - Karin, 2015. "Response of Central European Civil Security Systems to the Economic Crisis," Central European Journal of Public Policy, Sciendo, vol. 9(2), pages 142-152, December.
    20. Franca Maino & Celestina Valeria De Tommaso, 2022. "Fostering Policy Change in Anti-Poverty Schemes in Italy: Still a Long Way to Go," Social Sciences, MDPI, vol. 11(8), pages 1-22, July.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:kap:policy:v:55:y:2022:i:4:d:10.1007_s11077-022-09479-x. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.