Strategic Frames Analysis of NATO Ballistic Missile Defense and Changes in Public Opinion

Strategic Frames Analysis of NATO Ballistic Missile Defense and Changes in Public Opinion Strategic Frames Analysis of NATO Ballistic Missile Defense and Changes in Public Opinion Recognizing that successful strategic communication efforts are essential to generating and maintaining Alliance cohesion and progress towards fielding a NATO Ballistic Missile Defense (BMD) program, the CSC will conduct strategic communication analysis of the communication landscape surrounding the NATO BMD initiative. The project will reveal the impact and effectiveness of specific components within this communication landscape, and will also serve as an exemplar of the value to NATO of academic analysis in the field of strategic communication. To emphasize the prominent role of strategic communication in decision-making, the project will make use of ASUs Decision Theater technology and display space. Multiple independent variables will be modeled such that their interactions can be visualized in the Decision Theater format. The project will look especially for interactions between NATO public statements and public opinion in Alliance countries, NATO public statements and reactions from Alliance governments, and intersections with Russian government responses on those constituencies. The project will analyze the strategic frames evident in the documents that shape the perspective and intended response. The project will categorize documents (public statements from governments, documents in mainstream media) and cross-reference with political events and public opinion polling data. Political events may include key voting records from NAC and MC meetings and/or other significant action (e.g., break silence, form/dissolve consensus, etc.) that represent state behavior, if available. In order to illustrate the unique challenge of NATOs multi-audience strategic communication environment, the research will also examine the apparent audience of a given document, speech or other piece of communication to explore second-order impacts of messages (e.g., a message crafted for domestic US audience has impact on NATO-Russia relations).