The paper develops John Kingdon’s Multiple Streams Framework (MSF) through a theorization of how political problems come about. One important argument is that the framing of problems creates the context in which policy entrepreneurs try to get issues onto the political agenda. The way problems are framed creates possibilities or barriers for the coupling of specific policy proposals to problems. I argue that through the inclusion of the ‘problem broker’ in the MSF, the problem stream could be theorized. The problem broker frames conditions as political problems. Problem brokers can use different types of claims to convince their audience. These include claims based on logos – arguments based on knowledge and logic – and on pathos – arguments that appeal to emotions. The paper discusses how these two types of claims are used and mixed in the framing of problems, as well as what consequences this has for agenda-setting.
