Belgium

Datasets

Datasets are arranged by type. Click on a dataset name to expand its description (including date range) as well as to download a .csv of current data and a .pdf codebook that documents included variables. For information on how to cite this data please visit our how to cite page. 

Media

• Newspaper De Standaard

  This dataset contains data from newspaper De Standaard from 1999 to 2008. CAP topic codes have been manually coded. Krippendorf’s alpha reliability estimates are given at the end of the document.  The data between January 1999 and February 2004 include newspaper articles from the front page of De Standaard only.  The data between March 2004 and December 2008 include newspaper articles from the first three pages of De Standaard. This is done because the newspaper changed its format in March 2004, limiting the amount of articles on the front page to only one or two.

  
  20963 observations spanning the years 1999 to 2008
  download dataset   download codebook
• Television News

  The television data contain news items from two broadcasters: VRT (the public broadcaster) and VTM (the commercial broadcaster). The data range from 6 December 2000 to 12 January 2008.  Every news item is coded based upon one sentence that summarizes the news item. Coders have thus not watched the news broadcasts themselves – codes are based on the brief summary of the item only. 

  
  135582 observations spanning the years 2000 to 2009
  download dataset   download codebook

Parliamentary & Legislative

• Bills

  This dataset contains all bills introduced in the period between January 1988 and May 2010. CAP topic codes have been automatically coded, based on a conversion of the EUROVOC-code of the bill into the appropriate CAP code. The European EUROVOC-thesaurus consists of 6,797 words and EUROVOC-codes have been assigned to each bill by the administration of the Parliament. The file contains only those bills that are discussed in the federal House of Representatives (Senate not included).

  
  15682 observations spanning the years 1988 to 2022
  download dataset   download codebook
• Oral questions and interpellations

  The data contains the oral parliamentary questions and interpellations from 5 October 1988 to 21 April 2010, asked in the plenary meeting (= “plenaire vergadering”) or in one of the committee meetings. CAP topic codes have been automatically coded, based on a conversion of the EUROVOC-code of the question/interpellation into the appropriate CAP code. The European EUROVOC-thesaurus consists of 6797 words and EUROVOC-codes are assigned to each question/interpellation by the administration of the Parliament.

  
  48381 observations spanning the years 1988 to 2010
  download dataset   download codebook

Prime Minister & Executive

• Government Agreements

  This dataset contains most available government agreements from 1978 until 2008. Agreements were coded by hand at the lowest – quasi-sentence – level. Hence, some sentences have been split into several sub-items. Once split, all quasi-sentences were coded in response to the question ‘which issue is this argument emphasizing?’  Each quasi-sentence was then coded on its issue content using the comparative agendas codebook. 

  
  12936 observations spanning the years 1979 to 2008
  download dataset   download codebook
• State of the Union Speeches

  This dataset contains state of the unions (yearly government speeches) from 1993 until 2009. State of the unions were coded by hand at the lowest – quasi-sentence – level. Hence, some sentences have been split into several sub-items. Once split, all quasi-sentences were coded in response to the question ‘which issue is this argument emphasizing?’  Each quasi-sentence was coded on its issue content using the comparative agendas codebook.

  
  4783 observations spanning the years 1993 to 2009
  download dataset   download codebook

Political Parties

• Party Manifestos

  This dataset contains most available party manifestos from 1977 until 2007. Manifestos were coded by hand at the lowest – quasi-sentence – level. Hence, some sentences have been split into several sub-items. Once split, all quasi-sentences were coded in response to the question ‘which issue is this argument emphasizing?’  Each quasi-sentence was then coded on its issue content using the comparative agendas codebook. 

  
  174994 observations spanning the years 1977 to 2007
  download dataset   download codebook

download master topics codebook

Staff

Stefaan Walgrave

Title: Professor
Institution(s): University of Antwerp

Stefaan Walgrave is professor of political science at the University of Antwerp (Belgium). His research focuses on political communication and on social movements and protest. Within political communication, he directed an earlier agenda-setting project in Belgium covering the 1991-2000 period. He has mainly done work on the political agenda-setting power of the media and on how political parties interact with mass media and has published about these topics in journals like Journal of Communication, Political Communication, Journal of European Public Policy and Comparative Political Studies.

Julie Sevenans

Title: Project manager (from 2013)
Institution(s): University of Antwerp

Julie Sevenans is a PhD student in political communication at the University of Antwerp. She got involved in the Comparative Agendas Project through her work as a coder for the project. Her research focuses on individual political actors’ information acquisition and processing, whereby special attention is given to the political agenda-setting power of the mass media.

Jeroen Joly

Title: Project manager (till 2013)
Institution(s): University of Antwerp

Jeroen Joly is currently a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Toronto. He obtained his PhD from the University of Antwerp in 2013.  His main research interests include political communication, party governance and coalition politics in both the domestic and international sphere.  He is involved in the INFOPOL Project on the determinants of politicians' information processing, and he is also an active member of the comparative agendas project (CAP).

Anne Hardy

Title: Project manager (till 2013)
Institution(s): University of Antwerp

Anne Hardy is a member of the M2P research group in Antwerp since 2009. Her research focuses on the causes, mechanisms and political consequences of media storms.

Explore Policy Trends

Click to explore policy trends with Belgium pre-selected. The Trends tool allows for policy comparisons across governing institutions and countries.

The Belgian agenda-setting project collected issue attention data from different institutions and actors over a period of more than ten years.

Principal Investigator: Stefaan Walgrave
Location: Department of Political Science, Sint-Jacobstraat 2, 2000 Antwerp
Email: stefaan.walgrave@uantwerpen.be
Downloadable Data Series: 7
Time Span: 1977-2022
Total Observations: 413,321

Sponsoring Institutions

Funding for the Belgian agenda-setting project came from the European Science Foundation (grant number: 07-ECRP-008), from the Flemish National Science Foundation (grant number: G.0117.11N)  the Belgian Federal Science Policy (grant number: IUAP P7/46), and the TOP BOF University of Antwerp Grant (grant number FFB210426).

Belgian agenda-setting project