Integration and modularization: Research on urban cross-regional emergency cooperation based on the network approach

Abstract

Urban disasters and the practice of emergency management present obvious cross-regional characteristics given the increasing complexity of urban development and operating systems. Currently, strengthening urban emergency management cooperation and integrating heterogeneous emergency organization resources comprise the basic trends and common requirements to manage urban disasters. This study uses the collapse of the Xinjia Hotel in Quanzhou, Fujian Province, China, on March 7, 2020, as an example to construct an urban cross-regional emergency cooperation network and thereby clarify the mode and mechanism of urban cross-regional emergency cooperation. The structural characteristics of the overall network of urban cross-regional emergency cooperation and the cooperation network of different emergency function modules are examined based on the research framework of “Integration of the emergency cooperation–Modularization of the emergency cooperation.” Moreover, we explore the resource flow and interaction between the emergency organizations of different jurisdictions in urban cross-regional emergency cooperation. Further, the effect of each emergency module on the formation of cross-regional emergency cooperation is discussed. Thus, this study proposes optimization countermeasures from three aspects: system construction, organization coordination, and mechanism design. This research provides a new exploration of the urban cross-regional emergency cooperation between different types of emergency organizations, which is helpful for effective decision-making under different situations.