Exploring complex adaptive networks in the aftermath of the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake in China

Abstract In the decade since the Wenchuan earthquake of 2008, significant earthquakes have occurred in Yushu, Lushan, and Ludian in China. A comparison of the collaborative behaviors of emergency organizations in these four cases reveals some trends or regularities. This study uses complex adaptive network theory to examine three propositions: first, organizational collaborative behaviors are driven by tasks; second, government departments show less initiative in cross-sector cooperation than NGOs and enterprises; and third, the emergency management network has a core-periphery structure. All of these propositions are supported by our social network analysis (SNA), which considers modularity, centrality, cliques, and singular value decomposition (SVD) in a two-mode network. The results support the three propositions given above and suggest that emergency management networks are time-variant systems. In particular, we argue that estrangement between different sectors needs to be overcome to improve these networks.

[1]  Louise K. Comfort,et al.  Self-Organization in Complex Systems , 1994 .

[2]  John Scott,et al.  The SAGE Handbook of Social Network Analysis , 2011 .

[3]  Jeanne‐Marie Col,et al.  Managing Disasters: The Role of Local Government , 2007 .

[4]  David Landsbergen,et al.  Realizing the Promise: Government Information Systems and the Fourth Generation of Information Technology , 2001 .

[5]  John M. Bryson,et al.  Designing and Implementing Cross‐Sector Collaborations: Needed and Challenging , 2015 .

[6]  Warren S. Eller,et al.  The Core and Periphery of Emergency Management Networks: A Multi-Modal Assessment of Two Evacuation Hosting Networks from 2000-2009 , 2012 .

[7]  Louise K. Comfort,et al.  Integrating Information Technology into International Crisis Management and Policy , 1993 .

[8]  Kathleen M. Eisenhardt,et al.  Theory Building From Cases: Opportunities And Challenges , 2007 .

[9]  Naim Kapucu,et al.  Journal of Homeland Security and Emergency Management Interorganizational Coordination in Complex Environments of Disasters : The Evolution of Intergovernmental Disaster Response Systems , 2011 .

[10]  J. Lanzetta,et al.  Group Behavior Under Stress , 1955 .

[11]  Naim Kapucu,et al.  Interorganizational Coordination in Dynamic Context: Networks in Emergency Response Management 1 , 2005 .

[12]  Reuben R. McDaniel,et al.  Management Strategies for Complex Adaptive Systems Sensemaking, Learning, and Improvisation , 2008 .

[13]  Lance Gunderson,et al.  Insight, part of a Special Feature on Managing Surprises in Complex Systems Ecological and Human Community Resilience in Response to Natural Disasters , 2010 .

[14]  L. Comfort.  Shared Risk: Complex Systems in Seismic Response , 1999 .

[15]  Martin G. Everett,et al.  Analyzing social networks , 2013 .

[16]  L. Comfort,et al.  Coordination in Rapidly Evolving Disaster Response Systems , 2004 .

[17]  Louise K. Comfort,et al.  Cities at Risk , 2006 .

[18]  M. Ahmad.  Who cares? The personal and professional problems of NGO fieldworkers in Bangladesh , 2002 .

[19]  Daniel P. Aldrich,et al.  Building Resilience: Social Capital in Post-Disaster Recovery , 2012 .

[20]  L. Comfort.  Crisis Management in Hindsight: Cognition, Communication, Coordination, and Control , 2007 .

[21]  Zhang Hai-bo,et al.  Structural Change in China’s Emergency Management: Theoretical Generalizations , 2016 .

[22]  S. Carpenter,et al.  Social-Ecological Resilience to Coastal Disasters , 2005, Science.

[23]  R. Hanneman.  Introduction to Social Network Methods , 2001 .

[24]  S. Dawes.  Interagency information sharing: Expected benefits, manageable risks , 1996 .

[25]  C. Hall,et al.  The resilience of formal and informal tourism enterprises to disasters: reef tourism in Phuket, Thailand , 2012 .

[26]  Illés J. Farkas,et al.  CFinder: locating cliques and overlapping modules in biological networks , 2006, Bioinform..

[27]  Louise K. Comfort,et al.  Inter-organizational coordination in extreme events: The World Trade Center attacks, September 11, 2001 , 2006 .

[28]  Yi Lu,et al.  NGO collaboration in community post-disaster reconstruction: field research following the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake in China. , 2015, Disasters.

[29]  P. Slovic,et al.  FACTS AND FEARS: UNDERSTANDING PERCEIVED RISK.: P/3 , 1980 .

[30]  J. Bryson,et al.  The design and implementation of cross-sector collaborations: Propositions from the literature , 2006 .

[31]  Angela L. Bies,et al.  The Role of Nonprofits in Disaster Response: An Expanded Model of Cross-Sector Collaboration , 2007 .

[32]  L. Comfort,et al.  Complex Systems in Crisis: Anticipation and Resilience in Dynamic Environments , 2001 .

[33]  Fritz Morstein Marx,et al.  The Administrative State: An Introduction to Bureaucracy. , 1958 .

[34]  S. Borgatti,et al.  Analyzing Clique Overlap , 2009 .

[35]  Mark Dunn,et al.  Coordination in complex systems: increasing efficiency in disaster mitigation and response , 2004 .

[36]  Lian She,et al.  Incident Command System in China: Development and Dilemmas Evidence from Comparison of Two Cases , 2014 .

[37]  I. Vertinsky,et al.  Public–Private Partnerships for the Development of Disaster Resilient Communities , 2013 .

[38]  N. Mullins,et al.  The Group Structure of Cocitation Clusters: A Comparative Study , 1977 .

[39]  Brenda Murphy,et al.  Locating social capital in resilient community-level emergency management , 2007 .

[40]  Jörg Raab,et al.  Where Do Policy Networks Come From , 2002 .

[41]  Louise K. Comfort,et al.  The emergence of an adaptive response network: The April 20, 2013 Lushan, China Earthquake , 2016 .

[42]  Myrna Mandell,et al.  Evaluating Network Arrangements: Toward Revised Performance Measures , 2007 .

[43]  M. Newman.  Analysis of weighted networks. , 2004, Physical review. E, Statistical, nonlinear, and soft matter physics.

[44]  Mason A. Porter,et al.  A network analysis of committees in the United States House of Representatives , 2005, ArXiv.

[45]  Jean-Loup Guillaume,et al.  Fast unfolding of communities in large networks , 2008, 0803.0476.

[46]  Nah,et al.  The Collaboration Networks of Economic Development Organizations in Eastern Kentucky , 2015 .

[47]  Angela Espinosa,et al.  Sustainability, complexity and learning: insights from complex systems approaches , 2011 .

[48]  Naim Kapucu,et al.  Examining Intergovernmental and Interorganizational Response to Catastrophic Disasters , 2010 .

[49]  D. R. White,et al.  Structural cohesion and embeddedness: A hierarchical concept of social groups , 2003 .

[50]  Thomas A. Birkland,et al.  Lessons of Disaster: Policy Change after Catastrophic Events , 2007 .

[51]  C. S. Holling.  Understanding the Complexity of Economic, Ecological, and Social Systems , 2001, Ecosystems.

[52]  R R Dynes,et al.  Organizational adaptation to crises: mechanisms of coordination and structural change. , 1979, Disasters.

[53]  T. Drabek,et al.  Emergent phenomena and the sociology of disaster: lessons, trends and opportunities from the research literature , 2003 .

[54]  Yunong Huang,et al.  5.12 Wenchuan Earthquake Recovery Government Policies and Non-Governmental Organizations' Participation , 2011 .

[55]  Naim Kapucu,et al.  Collaborative emergency management and national emergency management network , 2010 .

[56]  Hamideh Afsarmanesh,et al.  Collaborative networked organizations - Concepts and practice in manufacturing enterprises , 2009, Comput. Ind. Eng..

[57]  T. Vicsek,et al.  Uncovering the overlapping community structure of complex networks in nature and society , 2005, Nature.

[58]  Dewald van Niekerk,et al.  Disaster resilience and complex adaptive systems theory , 2016 .

[59]  Naim Kapucu,et al.  Examining collaborative disaster response in China: network perspectives , 2015, Natural Hazards.

[60]  Fikret Berkes,et al.  Understanding uncertainty and reducing vulnerability: lessons from resilience thinking , 2007 .

[61]  Jeroen Wolbers,et al.  Incident Command Systems: A Dynamic Tension among Goals, Rules and Practice , 2014 .

[62]  Jiuping Xu,et al.  A comparative study on the national counterpart aid model for post-disaster recovery and reconstruction: 2008 Wenchuan earthquake as a case , 2013 .

[63]  Rajib Shaw,et al.  The role of nongovernmental organizations in earthquake disaster management: An Asian perspective , 2003 .

[64]  W. Waugh,et al.  Collaboration and Leadership for Effective Emergency Management , 2006 .

[65]  Michael McGuire,et al.  The effect of problem severity, managerial and organizational capacity, and agency structure on intergovernmental collaboration: evidence from local emergency management , 2010 .

[66]  N. Kapucu.  Interagency Communication Networks During Emergencies , 2006 .

[67]  C. S. Holling,et al.  Resilience and Sustainable Development: Building Adaptive Capacity in a World of Transformations , 2002, Ambio.

[68]  R. Yin.  Case Study Research: Design and Methods , 1984 .