Abstract
Guided by the Advocacy Coalition Framework (ACF), this study analyzes the discourse of actors involved in environmental governance in the Lake Tahoe Basin during a period of major policy change. It relies on discourse network analysis to extract relational data from articles published in three newspapers about the design, adoption, and implementation of the policy over a decade. The resulting multiplex network models the Lake Tahoe environmental governance subsystem via different types of relationships among actors theorized to be important by the ACF, including shared beliefs, interactions, and policy positions. Findings suggest that two distinct coalitions exist—one prioritizing environmental protection and one prioritizing economic development—that primarily engage in intra-coalition coordination but occasionally “tip the hat” to one another’s beliefs.
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Notes
- 1.
In Rounds 1 and 2, ten randomly selected articles were coded independently by three coders. Codes were compared and the codebook was revised to clarify directions and coding options. The process was repeated in Round 3, where three coders came to full agreement on codes across the same ten articles coded in Round 2.
- 2.
DeLong, J. 2011. “TRPA: Nevada bill could help force meaningful change.” Reno Gazette-Journal.
- 3.
A supplemental analysis suggests that, in general, those with relatively low coalition affiliation scores are more likely to engage in interactions across coalitions. Such a pattern contributes to accumulating evidence that extreme beliefs are associated with more polarized positions within coalitions (e.g. see Elgin 2015; Weible 2005). However, empirically testing and elaborating on such tendencies in relation to existing literature is beyond the scope of this chapter.
- 4.
Lotshaw, T. 2013. “TRPA, local governments, other groups defend regional plan in court.” Tahoe Daily Tribune.
- 5.
DeLong, J. 2014. “TRPA wins Tahoe lawsuit.” Reno Gazette-Journal.
- 6.
DeLong, J. 2013. “Critics sue to block new land use plan for Lake Tahoe.” Reno Gazette-Journal.
- 7.
We must add a caveat to this analysis in that the centrality measures across our networks are not directly comparable, given that some networks are one-mode while others are two-mode. We circumvent this concern by comparing the relative ranking of each actor’s centrality (versus raw degree) within each network.
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Acknowledgments
Thank you to Ashlyn Maher, who aided in data collection and coding. This chapter was presented at the 2019 Midwest Political Science Association Annual Conference.
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Koebele, E.A., Bultema, S., Weible, C.M. (2020). Modeling Environmental Governance in the Lake Tahoe Basin: A Multiplex Network Approach. In: Fischer, M., Ingold, K. (eds) Networks in Water Governance. Palgrave Studies in Water Governance: Policy and Practice. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-46769-2_7
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