Crises confront decision makers with persistent, interdependent demands that intensify under conditions of urgency, uncertainty, distributed authority, and public scrutiny. They must act rapidly while exercising judgment, coordinate centrally while preserving local discretion, and stabilize operations while remaining attentive to consequences that may emerge later and elsewhere. Drawing on paradox theory, crisis governance, and research on decision making in extreme contexts, this dissertation examines how such tensions become governable in practice. Its overarching research question is: How do decision makers navigate paradoxical tensions in crisis response? The dissertation develops a cross-level account spanning the response system, the central–local interface, and concrete decision episodes. The first study examines crisis response at the system level through a systematic review of 211 empirical studies published between 1993 and 2025 in management and public administration journals. It develops the Extreme Context Response System (ECRS) model, which links response mechanisms to operational and environmental outcomes and to feedback channels characterized by different temporal latencies. The review identifies recurring patterns in how consequences unfold over time. Operational outcomes tend to stabilize before environmental outcomes become visible; feedback travels through partially distinct channels; and time pressure concentrates attention on immediate operational priorities. Where environmental feedback is weak, delayed, or politically muted, operational primacy can displace risks and contribute to later environmental extremes. The second study examines hybrid crisis governance at the central–local interface during the Dutch public-health response to COVID-19. It focuses on the relationship between a central coordinating body and 25 regionally autonomous Municipal Health Services. The analysis identifies three coupled coordination mechanisms: a decision ledger, an exception interface, and a synchronized cadence. These mechanisms preserve decisions and their rationales, provide a bounded route for surfacing locally unworkable directions, and establish recurring moments for coordination, adjustment, and reconsideration. Together, they sustain accountability, predictable timing, and shared understanding while keeping central direction and local discretion jointly workable across levels. The third study examines concrete decision episodes in which leaders experienced paradoxical demands as undecidable. Drawing on interviews with all 25 regional public-health leaders, internal organizational documents, and field-based involvement, the study shows how leaders relied on ethical consideration when protocols, categories, and formal authority did not fully settle what should be done. Four recurring domains emerged: allocative prioritization, rule interpretation, temporal sequencing, and cross-audience alignment. Across these domains, leaders weighed duties, procedures, anticipated consequences, and audience expectations in order to render action defensible under uncertainty and scrutiny. These studies interconnect and conceptualize crisis governance as a cross-level process in which consequences, coordination, and ethical accountability remain connected over time. The integrated argument is that paradoxical tensions remain navigable when later consequences remain visible, cross-level tensions remain revisable, and difficult action remains defensible while response is still unfolding. The dissertation contributes to research on extreme contexts, crisis governance, and organizational paradox by connecting temporal, organizational, and ethical dimensions of crisis response. It further identifies practical design principles for response systems that preserve visibility of delayed consequences, support adaptation across interfaces, and sustain accountable decision making under pressure.
Hamidreza Khankeh, Samaneh Motalebi, naajmeh yazdanparast, Abbas Naboureh
Background: Over the past three decades, four international frameworks the Yokohama Strategy (1994), Hyogo Framework for Action (2005–2015), Sendai Framework (2015–2030), and WHO’s Health-EDRM Framework (2019) have shaped the disaster risk reduction (DRR) agenda. Despite advancing norms and principles, a persistent gap remains between policy commitments and implementation, particularly in integrating health systems.Methods: This study conducted a structured qualitative framework analysis of official UN and WHO documents, technical guidance, and monitoring reports. Frameworks were compared across four dimensions: governance, health system integration, monitoring and accountability, and financing/implementation guidance.Findings: Findings show a shift from state-centered governance toward multi-level, all-of-society approaches, although decision-making remains largely centralized. Health integration has progressed from minimal attention in Yokohama to explicit targets in Sendai and operational guidance in Health-EDRM; however, implementation remains fragmented. Monitoring systems have improved, particularly with Sendai’s 38 indicators, yet challenges in data quality and interoperability persist. Financing is consistently the weakest dimension, with limited guidance on sustainable funding.Conclusion: Overall, while DRR frameworks demonstrate normative and institutional progress, gaps in financing, decentralization, and alignment between Sendai monitoring and Health-EDRM implementation limit effectiveness. Future research should focus on translating global frameworks into local practice and their interaction with climate-related agreements.
Amidst a global surge in urban development foregrounding smart, sustainable, and now pandemic-proof design, new forms of longstanding hazard and health discourse are being deployed to justify dispossession, particularly in self-built districts. Looking at a case in Tirana, Albania, we examine how this discourse is being contemporized and paired with diverse digital media as it overlaps within a single project – the Tirana Riverside Project. As expressions of authoritative knowledge, architectural visualizations, social media posts, state-backed news broadcasts, and international design blogs work to validate this underlying ideology driving demolition. Such imagery and discourse, we contend, thus need to be read as artifacts of power that entrench government authority while substantiating mass dispossession. We argue that these processes are not only about the real estate profits demolition-based urban renewal generates but also – in Albania’s flawed democratic context – their ability to support the ruling elite. Using content analysis, we identify four hazard and health imaginaries overlapping within the project: 1) pandemic-proof design; 2) design for seismic emergencies; 3) zero-emission sustainable design; and 4) smart city technologies. We show how these imaginaries join longer traditions of normative discourse around hazard and health in urban renewal yet scrutinize their distinct contemporized and localized expressions.
Ensuring consistent progress toward cities’ net-zero emission goals requires understanding key dimensions of urban climate governance—particularly the motivations driving municipalities toward net zero and the critical barriers and enablers along this pathway. Current knowledge on these critical aspects is fragmented, lacking a holistic framework and empirical prioritization of key factors. We developed an integrated analytical framework and empirically distilled the most salient motivations, barriers, and enablers through a large-scale survey targeting 489 net-zero-committed municipalities—known as “Zero Carbon Cities”—across Japan. With responses from 309 municipalities, we deliver the first systematic mapping of factors perceived as most influential by Japanese local authorities. The results indicate that municipalities are primarily motivated by seizing local economic development opportunities (enhanced local energy conditions, financial gains and savings, and local industry revitalization), future-proofing communities against disasters, and enhancing the local quality of life. Key barriers and enablers were identified across four categories: municipal resources and authority (budgets, dedicated staff, and empowered climate agencies), knowledge and expertise (staff climate competence), institutional coherence (cross-departmental coordination and stakeholder involvement), and political will and leadership (the presence of climate champions and awareness within city halls and among residents). Accordingly, we discuss implications and derive recommendations toward strengthened local action in Japan and beyond.
Disaster risk, climate change, and unsustainable development are growing and interconnected challenges across Africa, where socio-economic vulnerabilities, environmental degradation, and institutional fragility converge to amplify risks. While the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction (SFDRR), the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and the Paris Agreement on Climate Change provide complementary global frameworks for tackling these complex issues, the true extent of their integrated implementation in the African context has remained largely unexplored. Existing research has tended to examine these frameworks in isolation, failing to capture their potential synergies and combined impact. This study fills this gap by assessing the integration of these global frameworks into national and sub-national planning and implementation processes in Africa. The study conducted a systematic review, complemented by a review of grey literature, covering the period from 2000 to 2024. The analysis combined qualitative thematic synthesis with quantitative assessment using MATLAB to identify trends, patterns, and integration gaps. Key funding reveals that while these frameworks are formally endorsed in Africa, their integration remains limited and inconsistent. Analysis shows that only 6.5% of Africa’s measurable SDG targets are on track, with 67.7% requiring acceleration and 25.8% off track for achieving the 2030 goals. Furthermore, fewer than 30% of African countries have adopted comprehensive strategies aligning DRR, climate adaptation, and SDGs. The study also confirms that fragmented financing, weak decentralization, and incompatible data systems persist as major barriers, limiting operational coherence and impact.
Abstract Public managers and administrators confront the increasing scale and prevalence of crises. Despite some deployments, blockchain applications by governments for emergency management and response management have only begun to scratch the surface. To facilitate greater awareness of the promises and challenges of blockchain applications to the public sector, we consider the ways in which distributed ledger technologies can improve emergency and crisis management across the dimensions of transparency, public trust, and social equity. The article ends with a call for a public administration research agenda on blockchains for emergency and crisis management.
This paper examines the enablers and consequences of less hierarchical organizing in which humane values are in focus as a path toward spirituality in the workplace. It describes Buurtzorg Nederland, a revolutionary case in home health care due to its radically decentralized structure and integrative, autonomous system of organizing. Data were collected by studying the responses of directors and nurses to the COVID-19 pandemic. A formative grounded theory methodology based on theoretical sampling using two additional qualitative data sets is used. The paper demonstrates that the simplification of organizational structures through integrative self-management helps to put the organization’s purpose at the center. Even in times of COVID-19 pandemic, this decentralized organizational architecture is empowering. The core concept of integrating simplification is elaborated using the enablers of serving, attuning, and trusting, wherein the concept of trust emerges as foundational.
Thushara Kamalrathne, Dilanthi Amaratunga, Richard Haigh
The entire world is in an unprecedented dysfunction since 11 th March 2020 when the WHO declared a global pandemic as unprecedented health and socioeconomic issues emerged with the outbreak of the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) and its associated 53 coronavirus diseases (COVID-19). This challenging pandemic has created a greater shock on regular activities of every social strata resulting in a significant decline in economic growth and health sector progression. A serious wearing down of infrastructure, human resources and emergency response in the public health sector was visible in many countries, irrespective of the level of economic and social development. In this backdrop, many scholars are exploring appropriate and effective resilient systems to govern pandemic risks in varied settings. It is observed that Sri Lanka's pandemic response is not properly embedded with the country's Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) framework and in many aspects, it is heavily reliant on the public health sector authority. In further elaborating the identified gap, this study explored many possible policy amalgamations that can be considered to improve the effectiveness of pandemic response activities at sub-national levels in Sri Lanka. Many government authorities, universities, volunteer agencies including NGOs, private sector organisations and the community can be efficiently integrated into pandemic response activities, vesting necessary responsibilities and authority for contingency and financial decision making at the sub-national level. This system further ensures the unique and contextual approach in pandemic response at the Divisional Secretariat level of each sub-region, which consists of diverse cultures. A large number of public officers are employed at District Secretary (DS) level in different areas of work such as finance, statistic and information, development, public health, livelihood, legal, police, child protection and probation, social welfare, elderly care, poverty alleviation, etc. within the public administration protocol adopted in Sri Lanka. These official positions can also be effectively integrated with the pandemic preparedness and response mechanisms at sub-national level.
Jeremy L. Hall, Staci M. Zavattaro, R. Paul Battaglio, Michael W. Hail
By April 2020, the United States had entered the early phase of the COVID-19 pandemic. We were observing the harrowing effects of the virus in China, Italy, and early hotspots in the United States. It was clear to us, as editors, that this crisis would upend traditional ways of operating in the public and nonprofit sectors. Once-clear administrative roles would be abandoned, and policies and procedures would be suspended, altered, or ignored to respond as nimbly as possible. The crisis has affected the private sector, individuals, families, schools, and—of course—the healthcare sector in ways that will be the subject of research for the ensuing decade and likely beyond. PAR has a responsibility to be at the leading edge of public administration research and practice, and as a service to our stakeholders, we decided that it was best to act quickly, provide a broad perspective, and capture what had already been learned around the world. We used our Viewpoint feature to frame the symposium because we felt it was too early to have access to complete data subject to rigorous analysis. Rather, we would offer lessons learned, best practices, and key problems that would serve to guide practitioners while also highlighting key areas that could be the focus of future research. The response to our call could not have been imagined; we received more than 200 manuscripts to consider, and we quickly realized that it is impossible to capture every perspective, every lesson, or even every country's experience in combatting this scourge. The crisis has highlighted learning opportunities that contrast centralized and decentralized systems and authoritarian versus democratic responses, as well as lessons in collaboration, leadership, intergovernmental relations, coproduction, health policy and management, immigration policy, transportation policy, budgeting and finance, economic development, and so on. While we are unable to present every possible perspective, the pieces included in this Viewpoint symposium highlight a diverse set of concerns that characterize our discipline's breadth of inquiry and global reach. It stands as a testament to the lessons our theories have long prescribed, to their limitations under conditions of extreme strain, and to their prospect for improvement in the world we now find ourselves making sense of each day. We encourage you to explore these perspectives, to draw from the lessons they provide, and allow them to inspire innovations in your own research or practice. There have been many crises throughout history, and the scale of this event is unrivaled in recent times, in part because the virus is invisible and ubiquitous—no city, county, state, or nation is immune to its infiltration and the myriad effects thereof, nor can they predict where it will next strike. Government bears the brunt of this burden, although after years of contracting out, collaboration, coproduction, and other networked service delivery mechanisms, nonprofit agencies and essential businesses have also played a role in the response. Exceptional factors such as a global economy with complex supply chains and interdependence, rapid information cycles that characterize the information age, and the most advanced science and healthcare systems in world history have risen to the occasion. Yet, the government structures and economic market systems have struggled to lead through seemingly antiquated legal, constitutional, and electoral institutions that continue to frame the structural foundation within which bureaucracy carries out its work (Hall and Battaglio 2020b; Meier 1997). We organize our questions for reflection based on themes we saw emerge—and continue to emerge—during the ongoing pandemic response. The essays in the Viewpoint symposium are meant to provide additional direction for future research, and we hope our questions do the same. We realize the list is not exhaustive, and many themes you see missing here will appear in the second installment of this Viewpoint symposium in issue 80(5). In the United States, the government response is framed through federalism—a historically divisive institutional framework. Indeed, Wilson (1995) proclaimed American Federalism to be a persistent source of political conflict in relations between the national and state governments since the constitution was ratified. The questions of sovereignty and the representation of governments, interests, civil liberties, and scientific expertise that are now emerging will all be framed by the constitutional foundations of federalism in the U.S. context (Hail and Lange 2010). Similar questions will arise to model governance systems around the world in explaining response to the virus, and explaining the performance thereof. Federalism affects nearly every major policy area (Marbach, Katz, and Smith 2006). In 2019, we mused about whether Federalism might be dead (Hall and Battaglio 2019); recent events have confirmed it is alive, well, and possibly mutating. As has been the case with major punctuations throughout history, the balance of power among nation and states is once again in question. What impetus has the pandemic generated to influence intergovernmental and intersectoral management? Will the policy roles begin to shift? Will a new model of federalism emerge? Just as the structure of the system matters, so will its political components. Political parties initially seemed to be acting as though they are together in the boat, but it has become clear that they are on journeys to different destinations. The pandemic pulled disparate ideologs together briefly to pass relief packages out of a sense of urgency, but discourse rapidly became tainted with the same rhetoric and hyperpoliticization we have recently lamented (Hall and Battaglio 2020a). Politics will influence policy and exert pressure on bureaucrats in ways that will affect performance. To fully understand the crisis and response, research will need to incorporate constructs that capture ideology or values of elected leaders and their constituents. If the fractured nature of American politics has crippled the government's ability to respond effectively, how can experts and professionals in bureaucracy—public administrators—take on the challenges of today that rightly deserve their attention? How can leaders summon the political will and political support to accomplish emergent policy goals resulting from the crisis? How do we move beyond extreme partisanship and gridlock to act effectively? How does the increasingly short public/political attention span affect the response? The public largely rallies around the flag in the wake of crises but then loses interest quickly. Will the policy window remain open long enough to bring about deep policy change? The response to COVID-19 has demonstrated the need for both leaders and professionals to put aside petty political differences and take advantage of each other's strengths to work collaboratively. Somewhat confounded by politics and ideology, leadership and crisis management will yield great lessons in explaining performance, or more likely perceived performance, in responding to the crisis. Some acts of leadership have been commended, but most have also been fiercely criticized as a result of the clear-cut side-taking that so characterizes our modern discourse. How leaders respond to chaos and uncertainty will clearly affect performance results but also reveal new ways of thinking about crisis response as entrepreneurial actions are subjected to further analysis (Battaglio and Hall 2019b). From a policy perspective, closely intertwined with leadership capabilities and ideologies, this pandemic is a punctuation that will manifest through a shift in popular attitudes toward policies at all levels (Roberts 2020). Drastic policy change has already been implemented in immigration, education, healthcare, transportation, economic development, agriculture/food production, elections, and others. Certainly, more changes will follow, and we are anxious to see whether those changes are temporary and short term or entrenched. As we reflect on the responses to the virus observed around the world, structure and culture must be considered in concert with—or in addition to—political persuasion and leadership. The degree of centralization versus decentralization shapes the speed with which responses can be made, the complexity of delivering the response, and the allocation of stored capacity at different levels. Authoritarian regimes have been able to act differently than leaders in democratic systems. Shared power moderates decisions. We also know that strategy matters (George et al. 2020). Excessive capacity is useless if it is used unwisely. While emergency management plans may have existed for many institutions, the nature of this crisis was unique in its effect on all organizations and geographic locations. Public health agencies and medical facilities dusted off aging plans to reign in the virus and treat its effects. Agencies in other functional areas were likely less prepared. At the core, one of the biggest challenges of this pandemic has not been changing the work that is done so much as adapting to new ways of implementing policy. If the past is an indicator, strategic planning will play an essential role as organizations adapt to their new realities (George 2020). Examining the central role of evidence in responding to the pandemic will also produce a new frontier in research. How is evidence useful when targets are seemingly nimble and subject to frequent movement? How has the rise of substantive experts in policy and management influenced the response strategy and performance? How has politicization of evidence impacted the response strategy, performance, and public perception (Hall and Battaglio 2018a)? Evidence-based practice (EBP), policy, and management will be a fruitful path for assessment in the aftermath of the crisis. Which approaches were effective? Which were not? Why were they effective in some locations and not others? The accumulation of data occurs quickly in the information age, and analysis of such data offers an opportunity to rapidly generate best practices and EBPs for agencies of every type (Hall and Jennings Jr. 2008). EBP provides a mechanism for integrating this knowledge into practice. Similar to the effective use of evidence in practice, we have also observed the utility of technology in tempering the crisis. Whether medical technology treating patients, medical research decoding the virus' genome and developing vaccines, or government agencies' use of cell phone apps to monitor individual movements, technology has been an integral part of the way we have responded to the crisis. Researchers may well investigate how technology mitigated the virus and how it could have done more. We remain curious as to whether there will now be political will to mobilize resources toward scientific and healthcare endeavors. Like the moon shot half a century ago, we have seen what can happen when leaders and professionals promote the use of technology to address a specific goal in a concerted effort. What role has capacity played in mitigating or worsening the crisis? While the federal government has the expertise and the resources essential to respond, states share constitutional and legal authority, and many have substantial public health capacity in their own right. As has been documented in the capacity/performance paradigm, the capacity to act is necessary but not sufficient to bring about desired performance (Hall 2008a, 2008b; Hall and Battaglio 2018b). Going forward, we may need to think about building and deploying capacity in different ways. Localized capacity is necessary because, when such an ubiquitous catastrophe strikes that affects literally every state and community, federal resources cannot be easily deployed to targeted areas of need. States should strengthen their capacities to take on a greater share in the burden of government to preserve a wide range of freedoms of action for jointly supported and administered programs (White 1953). Population centers will receive attention first, and cumulative federal capacity will likely prove insufficient to fulfill every need. Related to capacity is the unique nature of rural areas. There is a huge disparity between rural and urban areas in terms of preparedness, impact, and ability to respond. Research will do well to consider these differences as it seeks to understand the virus' impact and government responses. In 2019, we noted the importance of reduced boundary governance to modern public administration research and practice (Hall and Battaglio 2018b). Managing through partnerships, whether defined as public/private partnerships (PPP), collaboration, cooperation, networks, or joined-up government, is an essential aspect of modern governance, and the value of these partnerships within and across sectors has proven essential to the rapid and complex responses we have observed. The call for multiorganizational analysis is not new; Ostrom (1989) recognized it, and Elazar (1964) referred to it in observing the cooperative partnership between levels of government in American federalism. Of course, the involvement of multiple levels of government leads to increased complexity (O'Toole Jr. 2000), showing how deeply integrated many of these questions may be. Among the immediate federal responses was the collection of massive relief bills to be signed into law; this feel good action was fueled by fear more than evidence, by urgency rather than evidence of need. Throwing money at the problem will likely net unforeseen consequences; some of the strings attached to federal funding will likely result in the persistence of inefficient behaviors. How should managers balance urgency with accountability? Urgency increases complexity and uncertainty, which is a recipe for decreased rational analysis (Battaglio and Hall 2019a). As System I thinking dominates rapid-fire, gut-driven, managerial decisions to the exclusion of deliberate rational thinking characterized by System II, the potential for bias to influence outcomes will increase. To what extent is rational analysis warranted? Are different decision-making paradigms associated with different levels of performance? An enduring question for public administration is how much effort do we devote to accountability efforts versus mission-based activities (Battaglio and Hall 2018; Hall 2010). Rapid action often precludes transparency in the process, and under the unique constraints of social distancing employed during this pandemic, many previously open meetings have been held in a closed fashion or merely aired via social media platforms. This creates a potential barrier to accessibility based on access to computers and broadband internet. Has a lack of transparency impacted the quality of the response? As for accountability, there is clear tracking of the problem through infections, death counts, market losses, and unemployment. It is yet too soon to determine what efforts have been used to integrate performance measurement or management into the response. As you reflect on these structural and practical challenges, we encourage you to seek deeper understanding by reading the insights we have been able to compile from around the world. In this first installment of the symposium, we present 15 unique perspectives that reveal how deeply this crisis has challenged public and nonprofit managers around the world. Most provide lessons that can begin to help us shape our response. While we are only able to print half of the material in this issue, you can access the remaining pieces in our virtual symposium online (https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/toc/10.1111/15406210.covid-19). Now, let us take a look at what PAR's dedicated authors deliver in this issue. To address the question of the federal response, Kettl (2020) details the variety of responses across states and the federal government. He details some of the reasons why, and ways in which, state responses varied and highlights variations. It is in these variations that future research lies. Applying Kettl's (2020) federalism logic, Curley and Federman (2020) collected and analyzed a variety of state executive orders dealing with the pandemic. The authors find differences in enforcement, restriction, and suspension, and within the essay, they outline future research that can explain the results of these variations. What role did the executive orders play in stopping the virus spread? What accounts for the variance? Thanks to the pandemic shock, Roberts (2020) explains what he calls the millennial paradigm that, in his argument, will collapse. He, too, details some of the elements of federalism that might not remain after the pandemic punctuation. The September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks; the 2008 financial crisis; and the pandemic are all exogenous shocks to the governing system as we know it, so the question becomes: will these predictions come true? Similar to Roberts (2020), Moon (2020) takes a big-picture approach to understanding the changes to governance practices as a result of the pandemic. Using South Korea as a case study, Moon argues that an agile-adaptive approach might be a path forward for responding to crises. His essay prompts future research about agile principles in government (see Mergel, Ganapati, and Whitford 2020 for more on agile principles that can inform future research). Like Moon (2020), Yang (2020) uses China's response in Wuhan, the virus epicenter, to argue that paradoxes often guide governance practices, and even in normal times, those paradoxes should be examined for competing values structures. Yang (2020) points out that the pandemic can be an equalizer for government and governance as there really is no preparation for something on this scale that fundamentally shakes our normal processes. Thinking of these paradoxes as either-or choices rather than both stifles our thinking, and future research can further explore the paradoxes Yang (2020) outlines. Keeping with the theme of punctuations and change, Van Dooren and Noordegraaf (2020) explain that what we call normal science might not hold in crisis situations. They argue that how we "do" science needs to change but caution putting too much reliance on science to solve all societal problems. The piece raises fundamental questions about the role of expertise, and those questions are ripe for additional research. The Viewpoint symposium then shifts toward more case-based understandings of the crisis, using varying theoretical lenses, countries, and practical findings to inform research and practice. Using the lens of cognition, coordination, communication, and control, Comfort et al. (2020) conduct a cross-cultural comparative case study to examine the response readiness in countries with different governmental, structural, and cultural elements. More comparative research with these underlying values will be needed. Comfort et al. (2020) use a networked approach to examine their cross-cultural response, and Grizzle, Goodin, and Robinson (2020) also detail the challenges with building and maintaining strong networks that can respond to system shocks such as the pandemic (Roberts 2020). Using the City of Norman, Oklahoma as a case study, Grizzle, Goodin, and Robinson (2020) detail ways in which strong networks are built and how well those efforts fared during the COVID-19 response. Future research can build on their recommendations for building strong, sustainable networks in public management. In addition to building resilient networks, governments also need to focus on fiscal resilience, and Dzigbede, Gehl, and Willoughby (2020) use data about local government weather-related fiscal resilience to draw lessons for the pandemic, which is another crisis that can (and likely will) financially drain many smaller governments. Future research can address the questions regarding building networks for financial resilience in government agencies. Similarly, Maher, Hoang, and Hindery (2020) argue that, from a financial perspective, the pandemic is adversely affecting smaller nonprofit organizations and local governments that might not qualify for federal relief funding. The authors suggest innovations in the sectors to protect fiscal integrity and reserves, and more research will be needed based on their findings to examine innovation and change in nonprofit organization, fundraising, and networking. The same will hold for governments suffering financially. Many essays in the symposium rely on countries as the unit of analysis. Huang (2020) uses Taiwan as a case study regarding the pandemic response, which relied on collaborative governance strategies with in a governing Using rhetoric to the United States, response on an invisible so into their roles in The factors that into the response, such as and cell phone are open for additional research in Using as their case study, and (2020) use a approach to understand the pandemic response. They also how federalism between the state and governments affected the response in and the key to was an ability to change response on the on action and those actions when to have what many consider a pandemic response and 2020). American countries as their et al. (2020) examine how the same problems in the world are by structural such as social across systems and social and political are among the that the response to the In this et al. highlight some practices emerging in and on the and institutions that or across what can we do with all these How can we use data from countries to strategic change? et al. (2020) offer a guide for these performance so they can be used This will into our call for policy and management in the ongoing pandemic response. thinking, et al. (2020) can help the power of these data for future In an essay that takes a different (2020) uses data from managers to understand how they can play a role in emergency management The pandemic has a management and many of the experts death are not included in emergency so (2020) offers points to consider when is in the planning and essays reflect the breadth of questions about government response in of crisis and the of authority, cooperation, networked governance, fiscal civil liberties, the role of expertise and science in and of In of the breadth of these manuscripts capture only a of the many questions that the crisis has enduring research questions are by these but our list merely the of what the work of around the world will soon
Erik de Waard, Jori Pascal Kalkman, Myriame Bollen
Flexibility in organizations is important, especially when dealing with crises that develop in an unpredictable way. Existing management theory makes clear that organizations are confronted with different environmental dynamics and, therefore, need a mix of operational, structural and strategic flexible capabilities to remain viable. The present article uses this insight to analyze the flexibility potential of the Dutch Border Security Team Concept (BST). The BST concept has been developed by the Royal Netherlands Marechaussee as a practical answer to deal with the sudden migration crisis in the Eastern Mediterranean. The findings show that the composite BST unit has the potential to be really flexible. In sum, it has proven to be a comprehensive, semi-autonomous organizational element that possesses all the necessary capabilities to cover migration-related crisis situations well. Yet, the empirical results also bring to the front that the embeddedness of the BST within the overarching Frontex constellation affects the possibility to fully reap the benefits of organizational independence. Frontex’ standardized and highly formalized routines leave too little room for a customized decentralized organizational effort.
The Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, 2015–30, calls for countries to strengthen disaster risk governance systems as a pathway to disaster risk reduction. This paper assesses the disaster risk governance system in Malawi, Sub‐Saharan Africa, to understand how the positioning of multiple actors is contributing to the creation of an environment generating either positive or negative outcomes. The study utilizes a landscape governance analytical framework grounded within network governance theory and predominantly relies on qualitative approaches. The study finds that non‐governmental organizations are delivering the majority of disaster risk management services in the country. However, there are shortfalls within and across key actors and institutions that are frustrating progress and could reverse isolated gains that the country has made. While central government is largely detached from community‐level implementation, its incapacity is worsened by politicians and local government actors who have positioned themselves to capture risk reduction finance. The paper, therefore, questions the rationale behind the urgency in decentralizing disaster risk governance before addressing critical challenges within the local government system. These findings, while specifically for Malawi, are also pertinent to other developing countries struggling to deal with the consequences of climate variability and change.
Resumen. Este artículo analiza la implementación de un esquema de reducción de riesgo de desastres asociados a la actividad petroquímica en la ciudad de Coatzacoalcos, en un contexto de descentralización de la gestión de riesgos. El trabajo aborda el papel de las asociaciones público-privadas y el ambiente institucional en torno a las labores locales de protección civil y gestión de riesgos. El artículo identifica los ámbitos de acción de agentes públicos y privados, y analiza el marco legal, los acuerdos políticos informales y las regulaciones fuera del ámbito legal que permiten la colaboración de estos agentes. El estudio muestra que la funcionalidad de estas asociaciones se basa en formas de confianza y colaboración que no tienen como base los principios del marco normativo establecido por el Estado y los acuerdos internacionales en la materia. El estudio concluye que los beneficios y derechos adquiridos a través de redes personales constituyen el apoyo central de este ambiente institucional. Abstract. This paper analyzes the chemical hazards-related disaster risk reduction (drr) scheme in the petrochemical industry oriented city of Coatzacoalcos (Mexico) in the context of political decentralization. This work addresses the role of public-private partnerships, as well as the institutional environment around civil protection and chemical risk management. The paper identifies the scopes of action of public and private agents, and analyzes the legal framework, the informal political agreements and the non-legal regulations that allow these agents’ collaboration. The study shows that the functionality of these partnerships is based on forms of trust that do not rely entirely on the normative framework established by State organizations and international agreements; the trust that underlies their schemes of collaboration is relatively autonomous from the bureaucratic side of this institutional environment. The study concludes that the benefits and rights accessed through personal networks are the core of the institutional environment around risk governance.
William Siembieda, Laurie A. Johnson, Guillermo Franco
The Chilean earthquake and tsunami disaster of 27 February 2010 impacted 12 million people in 900 cities and towns, causing more than US$30 billion in losses. This paper considers how the national government responded to the challenges of coastal and urban reconstruction, and examines the actions taken in the housing, land use mitigation planning, insurance, and risk reduction management sectors. The Chilean government utilized a mixed decentralized model for recovery management with strong direction from the national‐level ministries and subnational planning and housing efforts at the regional and municipal levels. The national recovery plan guiding principles are used in this paper as a framework for progress. In 12 months, a series of temporary shelter villages and a system of recovery housing subsidies were established; risk‐based land use plans were conducted in various coastal areas; a finance plan was adopted; changes to the national emergency management agency were made; and rapid payment of insurance claims were completed. Conflicts did arise related to the speed of housing recovery support, expropriation of land sites as future tsunami protection barriers, and extent of public participation in recovery plan making.
Modern industries are handling the forces of nature on a stupendous scale.…Woe to the people who trust these powers to the hands of fools! Then wealth is destroyed, homes are overwhelmed, and loved ones killed. John Wesley Powell, “The Lesson of Conemaugh” The storm was not a surprise. We could see it coming. In August 2005 Hurricane Katrina was strong and massive as it approached the Gulf Coast and New Orleans. We knew that rising seas, sinking lands, and the loss of the wetlands and barrier islands that historically had buffered our cities and towns made us increasingly vulnerable to storms. We even knew, if we were paying attention, that it would overwhelm some of our levees and pumps leaving some of our neighborhoods flooded and our outlying areas devastated. We knew that. But we also believed some things. We believed that, bad as it might be, the levels of flooding, in New Orleans at least, would be limited to a few feet and most likely a few days. We believed that the levees and flood walls would hold and that the City would clean up, mop up, and move ahead with life as it always had. After all it had happened before – at least 38 times hurricanes have reached New Orleans – and besides, this is America and we do not let our engineering and public rhetoric get bested by nature. We believed that. We were wrong. The aftermath of Katrina, and its sister storm Rita, left us, the nation, and even much of the world stunned. How could such a thing have happened? What lessons did it teach? More importantly, have any lessons been learned? There will probably never be final answers to those questions but a few important things are already clear. Hurricane Katrina happened because it was inevitable. Storms are a natural part of this landscape the same way fires are to prairies and forests. We could not have prevented Katrina and will not be able to prevent the next storm. The death, destruction and dislocation that resulted from the storms are a different matter. They were not so inevitable. It was not a hurricane that wrecked New Orleans but rather a combination of trade-offs, compromises and decisions that turned powerful natural events into human tragedy. This is the central lesson, the central tragedy of Katrina. New Orleans, like most major port cities, was a hard bargain with nature from the get-go, but a bargain that had to be made. Its vulnerabilities to storms, flooding and disease were appreciated by its founders but more than offset by its strategic and commercial value. The city grew and prospered as a result of its proximity to the Gulf of Mexico and the Mississippi River and the attendant risks were managed through its infrastructure, architecture, and grit. Without the benefit of federal flood protection or flood insurance the city grew to greatness, its population reaching its zenith of nearly 650,000 in the early 1960s. Ironically, the seeds of Katrina's destruction of New Orleans were sown in large part by federal and local programs and public works projects intended to spur economic development and provide flood protection. Concerns about how navigation channels, oil and gas activity, drainage projects, and levees might degrade wetlands or increase flood risk were trumped by the prospect of growth and economic gain. Public funds were used to build levees around wetlands to induce development instead of increasing the protection for existing neighborhoods. State and federal involvement in the flood and property and casualty insurance business induced people to build and live in places and in ways that would have been unthinkably risky before. In short, people were in harm's way because it was, in effect, policy to put them there – the unintended but very real result of compartmenta-lized planning and decision making married to a pronounced practice of overestimating benefits and undervaluing risks and costs. Nowhere is this clearer than in the case of the hurricane protection system surrounding New Orleans. Hurricane protection for New Orleans, and as a responsibility of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, is a fairly recent development. New Orleans has had levees on the Mississippi Rivers since the time of French settlement. For most of its history, New Orleans was open to periodic hurricane flooding. By concentrating its development on higher ground and by elevating structures the city not only survived but thrived. Storms still came, but flood waters would drain, buildings would dry out, losses would be mourned and life would go on. Growth pressures fueled land reclamation projects in the 1930's along the shores of Lake Pontchartrain that drew residential development to the lake front and effectively created a levee, but it was one with houses on top of it, not one to protect what was behind it. Things changed dramatically in 1965 when Hurricane Betsy hit, the storm against which all others would be measured until Katrina. The flooding in some neighborhoods was much like that in Katrina. The response was anything but. In those days the nation's appetite for public works was much greater than it is today and President Lyndon Johnson spurred Congress to authorize a massive federal hurricane protection system for the entire New Orleans area that would guard it against the worst storm that might reasonably be expected. That was thought to be what we would now call a once in 200-300 year storm event1. It turned out that something very different was built. The system that was built – the system that failed – was the product of political and budgeting compromises, the failure to adapt to changing conditions and knowledge, and human error. That system, combined with the shifting of risk made available by the flood insurance program, led to changes in expectations and behavior. Low-lying areas were drained and developed, homes were built on slabs instead of being elevated, and less water resistant building materials were employed. The importance of natural defenses and individual and local responsibility were largely lost. After all, the federal government was providing protection and shouldering most of the burden. The perverse result of this was a city that gained protection but lost resilience. The net effect was a city at higher risk. The notion that decades of work and billions of dollars actually exacerbated risk is not an easy thing to accept. Harder still is the fact that the tens of billions of dollars that have been committed to patching the failed system and rebuilding the devastated communities since Katrina could have the same effect if important changes don't occur in the way protection, resilience, and community vitality are approached. First and foremost, before embarking on any flood or storm protection effort it is crucial to ask two questions: How safe do we want to be? What values do we want to enhance or secure in the process? The failure to ask these questions or to slough the answers, as happened in New Orleans, can be the difference between vitality and calamity. Admittedly, these are very subjective questions, but life is a subjective undertaking. The suggestion, often made, that we can or should leave these matters to objective scientists and engineers is a dodge. The best of our objective knowledge can inform our judgments and define our tradeoffs but they cannot set our purposes or make our decisions for us. This is particularly so when the key decisions are not technical in nature, but rather are legal or policy matters. This is what makes New Orleans's Katrina experience so instructive. But to understand the lesson, one first needs a little history. The vulnerability of New Orleans to hurricanes was well known. The Army Corps of Engineers had begun studying protection options pursuant to a Congressional study authorization in 19552. Those plans, still under development, took on a level of importance and urgency when Hurricane Betsy struck in 1965. Shortly thereafter, Congress directed the Army Corps of Engineers to develop a hurricane protection plan for the New Orleans region to combat a “hurricane that may be expected from the most severe meteorological conditions reasonably characteristic in the region”3. Roughly speaking, that meant a storm equivalent to a Category 3 storm on the Saffir-Simpson Scale or, as noted earlier, a once in 200-300 year event. Hurricane Katrina, a Category 3 storm at landfall in Louisiana, was in the range of storms that New Orleans was supposed to be protected against. Leaving aside the very real possibility of negligence and human error, the fact that those constructed protections not only were overwhelmed but failed is less a matter of having the know-how to have built a more robust and resilient system than it was of not having the will and wisdom to build that system. Such a system is more than a network of levees, gates and pumps. It is a purposeful and methodical approach to living with water that includes wetland conservation and restoration, land use controls, evacuation plans, adaptation to changing conditions (e.g., sea level changes and improved knowledge), and finally levees, gates, and pumps. There is nothing really new here. The importance of wetland and barrier buffers, flood-proofing, and land use planning and regulation were clearly recognized in the 1966 report of the Task Force on Federal Flood Control Policy and President Lyndon Johnson's message transmitting the report to Congress4. While urging greater federal involvement in flood protection, President Johnson wrote, “I cannot overemphasize that very great responsibility for success of the program rests upon State and local governments and upon private property owners in hazard areas. The key to resolving the problem lies, above all else, in the intelligent plan for and State and local regulation of use of lands exposed to flood hazard.” (Emphasis added)5. Despite that clear awareness, the prospect of levees spurred more development in low, wet areas and the construction of unelevated structures and the use of unresilient building materials. The over reliance on structural flood protection actually created new vulnerability and each year that passed without a major storm fed a growing belief, a complacency, that all was well and life inside the levees could go on without worry. Indeed, prior to Hurricane Georges (1998) New Orleans was not a place to evacuate from but a place to evacuate to. In and around New Orleans the appearance of protection had become confused with the fact of protection. That was never an intentional deception, it was one arrived at gradually through a series of compromises, tradeoffs, and mistakes. Rainwater flooding concerns trumped storm flooding risks. The need for land use controls and hurricane building codes were trumped by the desire for low-cost, quick housing and the assumption that the levees had eliminated the risk. Wetland conservation and restoration were trumped by economic development and private property rights pressures. And the need to adapt to improved knowledge about hurricanes, sea level rise, and coastal land loss was trumped by the pressure to build what had been planned and politically promised. The idea that just building something was better than nothing was irresistible. The foolishness of those tradeoffs is as apparent now as were the lessons of the Johnstown flood (Conemaugh) to John Wesley Powell6. But the pressures that led to them were predictable, just as it is predictable they will recur. Indeed if there is one common theme in humankind's reaction to great disasters it is the tendency to try to become ignorant of their lessons as quickly as possible. That instinct may have had utility in a distant past when human society had a more passive relationship with nature, but it is dangerous folly today. New Orleans is a portent of the challenges that face many places. We can muddle along, content to be victims of change, or we can use the best of our abilities – our science, our engineering, our laws, arts, ethics, and our policies – to be purposeful managers or stewards of change. There is scant middle ground. The central lesson of this tale is that the tradeoffs we make matter and there is hell to pay when we get it wrong. It is lesson well taught. Whether it is a lesson well learned remains to be seen. There is at least some evidence it is being learned. Wetlands restoration and accommodating sea level rise are now broadly recognized as essential components of flood protection and the sustainability of the region. The state has recognized the need for smarter land use choices and has adopted a state-wide building code. The Mississippi River-Gulf Outlet has been deauthorized. The Army Corps of Engineers has shifted from providing a levee system with a high protection target (against 1-in-300 year events) with a low confidence level to a lower level of protection (1-in-100 year events) with a higher confidence factor. Much more will be needed however. The real proof will come when the hard choices are made about which communities will get higher levels of protection – and when. It will come when the decisions are made whether to fully commit to conserving and enhancing Louisiana's coastal wetland landscape. It will come when land use planning is made a priority with the force of law. And it will come when the state and the nation decide to develop and implement effective strategies for contending with climate change and rising seas. None of this will be easy, but neither will it be easy to live with the consequences of standing pat. At stake in Louisiana and elsewhere is the fundamental tradeoff question: Are we as a people willing to make the laws, polices, investments, and commitments necessary to give ourselves a shot at a vibrant and sustainable future? The stakes are high and time is shorter than many think. Mark Davis is a Senior Research Fellow at Tulane University Law School and Director of the Institute on Water Resources Law and Policy at the Law School. He can be reached at msdavis@tulane.edu or 504-865-5982.
Infrastructure Resilience and Vulnerability Analysis