Presidential PR efforts and Foreign Policy
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The president. The presidential agenda is measured via the public relations efforts
of the presidents. The Public Papers of the Presidents is utilized to determine the
monthly frequency of mentions of foreign affairs issues by the sitting president. The
resource is included in the Nexis/Lexis online library. The search strings utilized the
following foreign affairs topics: foreign affairs; foreign policy; foreign relations; war;
foreign trade; balance of trade; defense; terrorism; and U.S. peacekeeping forces. The
retrieved documents are analyzed for their relevance to the research topic.
Statistical Analysis
This study employs Autoregressive Integrated Moving Averages (ARIMA) time
series analysis as popularized by Box and Jenkins (1976). ARIMA time series is an
appropriate method of analyzing the univariate time series in this study since there are
over 50 monthly observations (Montgomery, Johnson, & Gardiner, 1990). In addition,
this method is an accurate time series analytical tool since it calculates the first- and
second- order autoregression within each series.
Content Analysis
A content analysis is performed on the agendas of the media and the president not
only to accurately calculate the frequencies inherent in each agenda, but also to determine
the interpretations of the foreign affairs issue over time. Taken as a whole, the content
analyses of these agendas are used to determine the extent to which specific issues and
events dictate or drive each agenda.
The New York Times. Every article within the New York Times’ coverage of the
foreign policy issue from 1989 through 1996 is classified according to issue and event
categories as conceptualized by Shaw (1977). The attention of the press to specific sub-
issues related to foreign policy issues is tallied by month. The New York Times’
Convention