Exploring the Role of Political Agenda: Triadic Network Agenda-Setting on Asylum Seekers and Refugees Issues in Hong Kong

This study examines how three key agendas—media coverage (media agenda), public opinion (public agenda), and political discourse (political agenda)—interact in shaping discussions about asylum seekers and refugees in Hong Kong during its transition from semi-democratic to authoritarian governance. While existing research has explored bilateral relationships in agenda-setting, less attention has been paid to the simultaneous interactions among all three agendas, particularly in transitioning political contexts. To address this gap, we propose and apply the Triadic Network Agenda-Setting (TNAS) model, analyzing a comprehensive dataset of 1,758 news articles, 100,404 online forum comments, and 1,514 legislators’ Facebook posts using structural topic modeling and time series analysis. Results reveal that during the semi-democratic period, there were reciprocal relationships between public and media agendas, and significant political agenda influence on media coverage of crime, security, and detention issues. However, in the authoritarian period, these relationships weakened substantially, with political agenda showing no significant effects on either media or public agendas. These findings advance agenda-setting theory by demonstrating how media-public-political agenda relationships transform during political transitions, while offering practical insights for policymakers and advocacy groups working on refugee issues in semi-democratic and authoritarian contexts.