How activists and media frame social problems: Critical events versus performance trends for schools

This article focuses on the process by which a social problem is redefined in response to a critical event. Critical events are contextually dramatic happenings, such as economic depressions, environmental disasters, intense physical confrontations, strategic initiatives by a social movement organization, or new public policies. A critical event focuses public attention, which is itself a scarce resource in the claims‐making process. It invites the collective definition or redefinition of a social problem when movement activists, media operatives, and others compete over the meaning assigned to the issues evoked. A redefining critical event occurs when the perception of reality surrounding movement issues shifts markedly among elites and mass publics. In a case in Nashville, TN, for example, a tax‐increase referendum became a redefining event when conservative movement operatives successfully shifted “the problem” of the schools from issues of distributive justice to issues of efficient production. The pu...