Reaching for the Philosopher's Stone: Contingent Coordination and the Military's Response to

When Hurricane Katrina made landfall on the Mississippi Gulf Coast in August 2005, it immediately overwhelmed the abilities of local and state emergency management offi cials to respond to the ensuing disaster. Although the U.S. Coast Guard and some military units were on scene shortly after the passage of the storm, there seemed to be interminable delays before the military forces began to arrive in numbers to both provide humanitarian relief and secure the aff ected areas. Th is article analyzes the response of the National Guard, active-duty military, and Coast Guard forces through the lens of coordination. We fi nd evidence of the successful use of both traditional hierarchical and network-based coordination; we also fi nd support for Donald Kettl’s idea of “contingent coordination.”

[1]  Lawrence Kapp,et al.  Hurricane Katrina: DOD Disaster Response. CRS Report for Congress , 2005 .

[2]  Joseph L. C. Cheng.  Interdependence and Coordination in Organizations: A Role-System Analysis , 1983 .

[3]  E. Feigenbaum.  Simon, Herbert A. , 2006 .

[4]  Craig W. Thomas.  Public Management as Interagency Cooperation: Testing Epistemic Community Theory at the Domestic Level , 1997 .

[5]  J. Kenneth,et al.  MODELING THE IMPACT OF PUBLIC MANAGEMENT: IMPLICATIONS OF STRUCTURAL CONTEXT , 1999 .

[6]  Christopher Cooper,et al.  Disaster: Hurricane Katrina and the Failure of Homeland Security , 2006 .

[7]  Saundra K. Schneider.  Administrative Breakdowns in the Governmental Response to Hurricane Katrina , 2005 .

[8]  Kathleen J. Tierney,et al.  Emergency Medical Preparedness and Response in Disasters: The Need for Interorganizational Coordination , 1985 .

[9]  L. O'toole.  Treating networks seriously: Practical and research-based agendas in public administration , 1997 .

[10]  Michael Masters.  Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs , 2008 .

[11]  Saundra K. Schneider.  Governmental Response to Disasters: The Conflict between Bureaucratic Procedures and Emergent Norms , 1992 .

[12]  E. Jennings,et al.  Interorganizational Coordination, Administrative Consolidation, and Policy Performance , 1998 .

[13]  Lawrence Kapp,et al.  Hurricane Katrina: DOD Disaster Response , 2005 .

[14]  Donald F. Kettl,et al.  Contingent Coordination , 2003 .

[15]  Robert Agranoff,et al.  Inside Collaborative Networks: Ten Lessons for Public Managers , 2006 .

[16]  C. Wise,et al.  Organizing for Homeland Security after Katrina: Is Adaptive Management What’s Missing? , 2006 .

[17]  Gary L. Wamsley,et al.  Politics, Position, and Power: The Dynamics of Federal Organization. , 1972 .

[18]  Susan A. MacManus,et al.  Mandates and Management Challenges in the Trenches: An Intergovernmental Perspective on Homeland Security , 2006 .

[19]  Laurence J. O'Toole,et al.  Modeling the impact of public management: implications of structural context , 1999 .

[20]  R. Dahl.  The Science of Public Administration: Three Problems , 1947 .

[21]  T. Drabek.  Managing the Emergency Response. , 1985 .

[22]  L. Urwick.  Notes on the theory of organization , 1952 .

[23]  Saundra K. Schneider.  Flirting with Disaster: Public Management in Crisis Situations , 1995 .

[24]  Peter J. May,et al.  Recovering From Catastrophes: Federal Disaster Relief Policy and Politics , 1985 .