title: Social and political convergence on environmental events: the roles of simplicity and visuality in the BP Oil Spill.
abstract: This paper examines how and when newspapers, environmental nongovernmental organizations, businesses, and the government converge on environmental events. Using data on the 2010 BP Oil Spill from newspaper articles in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom, press releases by Greenpeace and Sierra Club, press releases by BP, Halliburton, Transocean, ExxonMobil, and Shell, and press statements by the White House Press Secretary, we examine an event's potential to trigger convergence of social and political action. By treating events as political actants, we examine arguments from the agenda-setting and social movement literatures on timing, simplicity, and visuality to understand when political actors converge. We find that convergence is related to temporal cycles but not simplicity or visuality.
authors.forename: Andreas
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Hoffbauer
authors.forename: Howard
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Ramos
mesh_terms: D002170:Canada; D060851:Gulf of America; D006801:Humans; D033181:Information Dissemination; D059392:Petroleum Pollution; D011057:Politics; D011639:Public Opinion; D012931:Social Environment; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors; D006113:United Kingdom; D014481:United States; D014877:Water Pollution, Chemical