Polarization and frames of advocacy coalitions in South Korea's nuclear energy policy

This study explores the structure of advocacy coalitions and frames over time in South Korea's adversarial nuclear energy policy subsystem. It relies on the Advocacy Coalition Frameworks and Discourse Network Analysis to guide data collection from 1149 policy statements in 502 newspaper articles of South Korea spanning four years. Using E-I Index, modularity index, and coalition polarization for data analysis, it finds an alignment of advocacy coalitions with increasing polarization through external events and the ongoing adaptation of frames to these events. The findings contribute insights into the characteristics of distinct, stable, and polarized coalitions and their frames in the high-conflicted policy areas in tumultuous times in the context of non-Western countries.