Agenda-Setting in a Quasi-Democratic Country

This study attempted to answer the question: how does agenda-setting work in a country like Egypt? By looking at the most prominent issues in the media coverage in the main Egyptian newspapers (media agenda) and the ranking of the most important issues in the public consciousness (public agenda), this study aims to bring to attention the dynamics of agenda setting in Third World countries countries that have different economic, social and political contexts. It thus presents a further step towards understanding the intricacies of agenda setting when applied to the quasi-democracies of some Third World countries.The study adopted two research methods: content analysis and questionnairebased survey research. Two main daily Egyptian newspapers, Al-Ahram as a national (state) newspaper and Al-Wafd as an opposition newspaper, were contentanalysed to determine the media agenda. A questionnaire-based survey research was conducted among 400 respondents to investigate the public agenda. The findings supported a positive correlation between media agendas and public agendas at the aggregate level. Furthermore, the results indicated a significant correlation between the opposition newspaper's agenda and that of its readers. Little support was found between the governmental newspaper's agenda and that of its readers.