Measuring Frame Evolution: Smoothed Temporal Framing Trajectories in Complex Policy Debates

The European Union faces long-term governance challenges in contested domains, such as migration management, health data sharing, and facial recognition technology. Across these fields, political debates are shaped by shifting ways in which actors frame problems and solutions. Understanding how such framing contests evolve over time is crucial for explaining both integration dynamics and the capacity of EU institutions to govern effectively. This article develops the mathematical foundations of a comparative approach to frame evolution by extending discourse network analysis, acknowledging the relational nature of collective action framing. Partitioning trajectories into distinct states and phases reveals key types of frame evolution: progressive versus regressive, entangled versus disentangled, and fast-paced versus slow. This typology provides a basis for linking framing dynamics to EU integration and policymaking processes. The article makes three contributions: operationalising collective framing trajectories; introducing a temporal kernel smoothing approach; and identifying comparative dimensions across policy debates.