ABSTRACT
This conclusion presents some closing thoughts discussed in the preceding chapters of this book. The book describes a comparative analysis of elite framing and public opinion over the course of the Iraq war has highlighted a two-way relationship between the government's selected communication strategy and the public's perception of the issue. The study has confirmed the powerful effect of framing and the possibility for political elites to influence what people know and think about a major foreign policy issue. A longitudinal perspective has served to illustrate the functioning of the cycle of framing and the interplay between the actors participating in the frame-building process during all the stages of the Iraq war. The cross country dimension has contributed to add external validity to the theoretical model and overcome the United States-centric bias prevalent in prior research. In France, Jacques Chirac's multilateral solution was never contested. Neither the opposition nor the press questioned the president's rationale for staying out of the war.
