Communication under Fire: The Role of Embeddedness in the Emergence and Efficacy of Disaster Response Communication Networks

Abstract

Communication networks among responders are critical to effective coordination and information transfer across agencies active in a disaster response. Using the theory of embed dedness, we investigate how aspects of relational and institutional embeddedness influence the emergence and efficacy of interactions among responding agencies using network data from three significant wildfire events in the wildland/urban interface. For this study, relational embeddedness is investigated as the degree of familiarity between two responders before the incident. Institutional embeddedness is explored in terms of nesting within shared affiliations and common roles. Our findings suggest that both relational and institutional embeddedness significantly shape the disaster communication network during an incident, but relational embeddedness appears to play a stronger role. Further, the most problematic interactions appear to occur among institutionally embedded responders who do not know each other. Consequently, knowing something about relational and institutional embeddedness within the network of responders before an incident provides insight into what the communication network will look like when a disaster occurs. Findings also provide insights for how we might mitigate risk for problematic information flow and coordination during the incident. INTRoDu CTIoN Failures in effective communication and coordination within the network of responding organizations and agencies during a disaster can lead to problematic and even dangerous outcomes (Eikenberry, Arroyave, and Cooper 2007; Kapucu and Van Wart 2006). For this reason, a key area of concern in the study of disasters is the interactions that take place among leaders of these organizations and their effect on the collective response. Although a growing literature has documented the structure of disaster response networks (e.g., Comfort 2007; Comfort and Kapucu 2006; Kapucu 2005, 2006; Kapucu,