How agenda-setting attributes shape politics: basic dilemmas, problem attention and health politics developments in Denmark and the US

We propose a new approach to the study of comparative public policy that examines how the agenda-setting attributes of an issue combine with problems to drive political attention. Whereas existing comparative policy studies tend to focus on how institutional or programmatic differences affect policy and politics, we begin by asking how the issue itself affects politics across nations. We illustrate by comparing health care attention and policy developments in Denmark and the US over fifty years. These two industrialized democracies have very different political and health care systems. Nevertheless, similar trends in political attention to health emerge. We argue that these high levels of attention reflect the issue’s political attractiveness with regard to vote-seeking and the fact that neither system has managed to resolve the basic dilemma of how to control costs while meeting public expectations concerning access to services and health care quality.