Emergency Management Capacity Research Articles

What Leads to Effective Emergency Management? A Configurational Analysis of Empirical Cases of Local Chinese Governments

This study investigates the foundational elements that contribute to effective emergency management in urban settings, with a particular focus on experiences from Chinese municipalities. Drawing on resource dependence theory and attention allocation theory, this research develops an analytical framework encompassing four pivotal factors: environmental resources, information sharing, social participation, and leadership attention allocation. Utilizing Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA), we examine these factors across sixteen critical incidents of urban accidents and disaster responses in China. Our findings reveal that a high degree of leadership attention allocation is an essential prerequisite for municipal governments to exhibit robust emergency management capabilities during crises. Furthermore, two primary pathways affecting emergency management capacity were identified: the “resource–leadership attention type” and the “social participation–resource coordination type”. These findings contribute to a nuanced understanding of the complexities of emergency management and enlighten the local governments to take some effective measures to enhance emergency management capacities to mitigate disaster losses.

Enhancing urban emergency management: A two-stage network DEA analysis of Chinese cities

In order to scientifically evaluate the emergency management capabilities of major cities in China, this article conducts a comprehensive study on the input and output indicators of emergency response in each city. A two-stage network DEA model was used to construct an evaluation model that reflects the emergency management capacity of cities. A dataset containing emergency management data from 36 well-known cities in China was selected to effectively evaluate its performance, and the city that demonstrated the most effective input-output ratio in the field of emergency management was ultimately determined. The research results show that using a two-stage network DEA model as the foundation to construct an evaluation model that reflects urban emergency management capabilities can promote a wise combination of subjective and objective evaluations, and achieve scientific investment in urban emergency assets.

Who Wants to Pay More? Exploring Citizen Willingness to Pay for Supporting Local Emergency Management

Local emergency managers play a significant role in mitigating, preparing for, responding to, and recovering from disasters. However, the fiscal stress that local governments often face limits their ability to hire and retain emergency managers within their jurisdiction. In this article, we aim to investigate public demand and support for hiring full-time, paid local emergency managers, a critical step to enhancing local emergency management capacity. We utilize the Contingent Valuation Method (CVM) to examine the average amount of additional local taxes that citizens are willing to pay in order to have a full-time, paid emergency management professional in their local government. Our analysis indicates that the average willingness to pay (WTP) for hiring a full-time, paid emergency manager ranges from $24 to $28 per household in extra local tax dollars. The estimated cost-benefit ratio suggests that hiring full-time paid emergency managers could be a cost-effective option for enhancing local emergency management capacity. Furthermore, our findings show that public willingness to pay for this policy change is correlated with social trust, political beliefs, and income level.

An integrated group decision-making framework for evaluating the urban fire emergency management capability based on PDHLWPHM and PDHLWPGHM operator

Urban fire accident is a common dangerous accident in urban sudden accidents, which threatens the safety of people’s lives and property. For this reason, in recent years, all cities have incorporated the prevention and emergency management of urban fire accidents into their urban development planning, and actively improved their fire accident emergency management capabilities. However, how to evaluate the urban fire accident emergency management capacity of each city to ensure that people’s lives and property are protected to the greatest extent is an urgent problem to be considered and solved. Therefore, this paper defines a class of probabilistic double hierarchy linguistic Heronian mean (PDHLHM) operator, probabilistic double hierarchy linguistic Power Heronian mean (PDHLPHM) operators, and their dual operators that can reflect the relationship between two attributes during aggregation. Taking urban fire accident risk monitoring and early warning capability, fire infrastructure and communication system, fire-fighting and rescue capability, recovery and reconstruction capability as evaluation attributes, the probabilistic double hierarchy linguistic weight Power Heronian mean (PDHLWPHM) operator model and the probabilistic double hierarchy linguistic weight Power geometric Heronian mean (PDHLWPGHM) operator model are constructed for group decision-making. In addition, the idempotence, boundedness and monotonicity of these operators are studied, and the sensitivity of the parameters involved in the operator model is analyzed. Finally, the new model proposed in this paper is compared with the existing model to verify its scientificity.

Introducing www.epidemic-em.org: A Collection of Online Resources and Training Materials for Strengthening use of Emergency Operations Centers for Epidemic Response.

This work aimed to demonstrate that a website, www.epidemic-em.org, encompassing "static" resources, and videos, as well as other tools, can be used to strengthen public health emergency management capacity during epidemic response. Existing resources were updated and developed for self-directed Emergency Operations Centers' capacity strengthening, in order to encompass current best practices, and to emphasize how public health emergency management concepts can support epidemic response activities. These materials formed the core of the website, launched in June 2020, to which country case studies were added. In 2021, a pilot virtual training program was designed using recorded video lectures and interviews with global experts in addition to the website material, which was delivered to South African responders. The website has been accessed in more than 135 countries, demonstrating widespread reach and interest in online and freely accessible materials to support public health emergency operations. Over 30 people participated in the pilot virtual training, and the evaluation showed improvement in knowledge, confidence in using emergency management concepts for epidemic response, and positive feedback on the virtual modality. Online tools can expand access to materials and resources for public health emergency management capacity strengthening. Virtual modalities can further serve as a powerful complement, and perhaps replacement, for traditional in-person technical assistance, despite some limitations.

China after COVID-19

Background:
 The COVID-19 pandemic has seriously affected global public health security and economic development, and is a huge test for China and other countries around the world. Among the factors affecting the outbreak of the epidemic, human abuse of wildlife appears to be the most important. Under the influence of relevant factors, China has formulated and implemented policies, laws and regulations on a comprehensive ban on wildlife.
 Objectives:
 Through the integration and impact analysis of China's comprehensive wildlife fasting policy and relevant laws and regulations, this paper aims to provide reference for other countries in epidemic prevention and control and the improvement of public health governance.
 Methods:
 Through the integration of relevant policies and regulations and detailed introduction, the author studied from three aspects: policies and regulations related to people's life, health and safety, improvement of public health and safety risk prevention and promotion of environmental protection and human civilization development, and analyzed its impact on all aspects of human society, especially public health safety and emergency management system and management capacity, to remind people to change the habit of over eating wild animals.
 Results:
 The article is of reference and guiding significance in promoting the global implementation of comprehensive fasting for wild animals, and in the current epidemic prevention and control of other countries, maintaining social public health and security governance, and safeguarding human health.
 Main Contribution to Evidence-Based Practice:
 The article demonstrates that the relevant policies, laws and regulations of China's comprehensive prohibition of wildlife have reference and guiding significance for epidemic prevention, maintenance of social public health and safety management, and protection of human health. In addition, it has promoted the global implementation of a comprehensive ban on wildlife.

The Evaluation and Obstacle Analysis of Urban Safety Resilience Based on Multi-Factor Perspective in Beijing

Urban resilience assessment is crucial to guarantee the safe and stable operation of our cities. Looking at the whole process of emergencies from the occurrence, development, causing disaster losses to taking emergency response measures, we combine the danger of urban accident and disaster, the capacity of disaster-bearing carriers, and the emergency management capacity as the influencing factors. Taking Beijing as an example, considering the completeness of the relevant indicators and the difficulty of obtaining data, TOPSIS is used to construct a multi-factor comprehensive assessment model of urban safety resilience; At the same time, the important factors constraining the improvement of safety resilience are further analyzed by using the obstacle degree model. The results show that: among the 16 districts in Beijing, Chaoyang and Haidian districts have the highest level of safety resilience; the level of the degree of disaster tolerance among the multi-factors has the greatest impact on the level of urban safety resilience in Beijing; and the multifactorial comprehensive assessment model of urban resilience is able to reflect the urban resilience distribution, discover the weaknesses that exist in the development of urban safety and provide decision-making aids for the relevant city managers to carry out urban resilience construction.

The Mine Emergency Management Capability Based on EWM-CNN Comprehensive Evaluation

By establishing an evaluation system for emergency management capability for coal mine enterprises, the problems and shortfalls in coal mine emergency management can be identified. Moreover, this evaluation method holds promise in enhancing the ability to respond to emergencies in coal mines. The current research conducts both theoretical analysis and field research to determine and extract 26 factors that impact the emergency management capability of coal mining companies. The collected data is analyzed using SPSS version 24.0 and undergoes reliability and validity assessments. Subsequently, the entropy weight technique is utilized to determine the weight of individual evaluation system indices. As an effective evaluation tool, the trained convolutional neural network (CNN) model can accurately and effectively predict the satisfaction of the samples outside the training sample set, providing suggestions for improving coal mine emergency management. The trained model is employed to make empirical predictions and analyze the XY coal mine. The findings indicate that the overall emergency management capacity of the coal mine is II, which is at a good level. The evaluation results are consistent with the actual situation, and suggestions are provided for improving the emergency management ability of coal mines.

Emergency management capability evaluation of chemical parks based on PFDEMATEL‐G1 and PFTOPSIS

AbstractConducting an evaluation of the emergency management capacity of the chemical park and implementing targeted improvements based on the assessment results can significantly enhance the emergency preparedness and response capabilities of both the management departments and enterprises. This article proposes an emergency management capability assessment model for chemical parks based on PFDEMATEL (the Pythagorean fuzzy decision‐making trial and evaluation laboratory)‐G1 (the ordinal relation method) and PFTOPSIS (the Pythagorean fuzzy set TOPSIS). Firstly, based on the four stages of emergency management of chemical parks, emergency prevention, emergency preparedness, emergency response, and emergency recovery, an index system for evaluating the emergency management capacity of chemical parks was established. Secondly, PFDEMATEL is used to modify the G1 method to determine the index weight, so as to realize the objective rationality of the G1 method empowerment. On this basis, an emergency management capability evaluation model of chemical park to improve PFTOPSIS is proposed. Finally, taking three chemical parks as examples, the applicability of the evaluation model is verified. The research results can provide a theoretical reference for the emergency management decision‐making of governments and enterprises, improve the status quo of emergency management, and improve the prevention and handling capabilities of emergencies.

Critical national response in coping with Omicron variant in China, Israel, South Africa, and the United States.

The aim of this study was to analyze the effectiveness of prevention and control strategies and put forward further measures according to the epidemiological characteristics of Omicron. It summarized the national response during the Omicron epidemic in four countries: China, Israel, South Africa, and the United States. This study summarized prevention and control measures in China, Israel, South Africa, and the United States in their response to the Omicron epidemic, and it also evaluated the effectiveness of these measures. After the Omicron variant emerged, China and Israel adopted containment strategies, using the "dynamic zero" policy and country closure measures. Meanwhile, South Africa and the United States adopted mitigation strategies, which virtually abandoned social interventions and only focused on medical measures and vaccines. From the first day of reported Omicron cases to 28 February 2022, the four countries reported the following cases: China reported 9,670 new confirmed cases and no deaths, with total deaths per million of 3.21; Israel reported 2,293,415 new confirmed cases and 2,016 deaths, with total deaths per million of 1,097.21; South Africa reported 731,384 new confirmed cases and 9,509 deaths, with total deaths per million reaching 1,655.708; the United States reported 3,042,743 new confirmed cases and 1,688,851 deaths, with total deaths per million reaching 2,855.052, which was much higher than the other countries. Based on this study, it seems that China and Israel adopted containment strategies, while South Africa and the United States adopted mitigation strategies. A rapid response is a powerful weapon against the Omicron epidemic. Vaccines alone will not get any country out of this crisis, and non-pharmacological measures should be used in addition to them. According to the SPO model, future work should consider the strengthening of emergency management capacity, adhering to public health measures, promoting vaccination, and strengthening patient care and close contact management, which are effective measures in coping with Omicron.

Did COVID-19 affect rural households’ subjective well-being? A social survey from rural China

Improving rural households' subjective well-being is an important element of economic and social revitalization in the post-epidemic period. Based on the survey data obtained from rural households in Hubei Province, the center of the outbreak in China, and its surrounding areas, this paper explores the impact mechanisms of the COVID-19 epidemic on subjective well-being from both economic and sociological perspectives with the help of structural equation modeling. The results show that COVID-19 significantly influenced rural households' subjective well-being in China. Furthermore, COVID-19 indirectly affected their subjective well-being by influencing optimism. The negative impact is moderated by government intervention and income resilience. Therefore, strengthening the emergency management capacity of local governments and encouraging the diversification of rural households’ income sources are important strategies to effectively resolve epidemic shocks and improve the level of well-being.

Emergency management capacity assessment for urban rail transit—an example of Beijing Metro Line 13

Abstract In order to improve the emergency management capability of urban rail transit system and reduce accidents during metro operation, an emergency management capability evaluation method combining analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and technique for order preference by similarity to ideal solution (TOPSIS) is proposed. Based on the Prevention Preparation Response Recovery (PPRR) model, factors influencing the emergency management capability of the urban rail transit system are summarized from the perspective of ‘human, machine, environment and management’. Then, an emergency management capability evaluation index system containing of 20 secondary indicators is constructed in four stages: emergency prevention, emergency preparation, emergency response and emergency recovery. The weights of indicators are calculated using the AHP method, and the closeness of each indicator to the optimal solution is analysed with the TOPSIS method. Finally, take the Beijing Metro Line 13 as an example to investigate the level of emergency management capability of urban rail transit. The results show that the emergency management capability of Beijing's urban rail transit system is ‘well’, among which hazard prevention measures (0.31) and emergency response team (0.34) have a greater weight on the emergency management capability of rail transit. The model can more accurately assess the emergency management capability of urban rail transit and provide a basis for emergency management.

Establishment and Application of a Specialized Physical Examination Indicator System for Urban Waterlogging Risk in China

With the rapid development of urbanization in China, urban waterlogging has become a significant problem in constructing the safety of the human environment. As an essential manifestation of the modernization of the urban governance system and capacity, the city physical examination establishes a multi-criteria evaluation system for problem diagnosis, rectification, and improvement. In order to accurately identify the risk of urban waterlogging, the concept of special physical examination of urban waterlogging risk was established, and the evaluation mechanism and indicator definition were improved on the basis of the “four-factor method” of flooding disaster assessment. From the perspective of urban basin flood control capacity, background disaster-bearing conditions, “Major-Minor-Micro” drainage system capacity, crucial locations and personnel protection, and emergency management capacity, twenty-four indicators in five categories were selected. The interaction between multiple factors is considered to establish a special physical examination indicator system as a characteristic evaluation mechanism of waterlogging with the goal of urban safety and resilience. The results of the study could provide theoretical and technical support for the diagnosis of urban waterlogging risk problems and the formulation of prevention and control strategies.

Government crisis communication innovation and its psychological intervention coupling: Based on an analysis of China's provincial COVID-19 outbreak updates.

Outbreak updates are an integral part of crisis communication during epidemics. Regarding the COVID-19 crisis communication, localities in China present different strategies for managing outbreak updates, which largely determine the effect of crisis communication and the evolution of social psychology. Depending on the analysis of the update texts from 31 provincial (autonomous regions and municipalities directly under the central government) health committees in China, the study found the differences among the provincial outbreak updates and summarizes 12 innovative crisis communication ways. A coupling analysis was applied using the equilibrium-cognitive-psychosocial transition model to further expound on the psychological connotation and intervention potential of the crisis communication innovations. Coupling crisis communication with interventions has a positive effect on designing crisis communication strategies by taking into account psychological factors. It can help construct and optimize the public crisis communication systems and emphasize "care" in modernizing the emergency management capacity.

Regional Geological Disasters Emergency Management System Monitored by Big Data Platform

In order to deal with the hazards caused by geological disasters in time, an emergency management system is proposed based on association rule data mining. With the support of a big data platform, a regional geological disaster emergency management system is built based on monitoring data. In the result analysis, the association rule algorithm demonstrates high computing power in the test, which can filter the data with strong association rules. In addition, the big data platform can allow data visualization, which has good data storage capacity and disaster early warning capacity. In the simulation test of the emergency management system, it was found that the system is feasible in theory. When it is applied to the actual disaster emergency management, it wasfound that, in the face of geological disasters, the processing speed of relevant departments increased by 59.4%, and the allocation of personnel and materials wasmore reasonable. The above results show that the big data platform monitoring data can improve the regional geological disasters emergency management capacity and ensure the safety of people’s lives and property.

Systematic evaluation of emergency management capacity for rural public health emergencies

Rural areas' emergency response capacities are generally weaker when compared to tier one cities and this can have an adverse effect on residents' livelihood and health. Evaluation of rural emergency management is of great significance for improving the rural emergency management capacity. This paper innovatively constructs an evaluation system for the emergency management capabilities with the rural public health emergencies, which includes four dimensions: emergency subject, mechanism, resources and concept. A Projection Pursuit model for objectively processing high-dimensional is constructed, and data from 2010 to 2020 in the rural areas of Xiantao City are selected as samples for empirical research. The results show that: (1) Each dimension of emergency management of public health emergencies contributes more than 20% to the ability. Compared with the other three dimensions, contribution of the emergency concept accounted for the lowest proportion, which was 21.69%, and indicates that this dimension is the key factor restricting the improvement of the emergency management capabilities. (2) From 2010 to 2019, the average annual growth rate of comprehensive emergency management capacity in the rural areas of Xiantao City was 14.9%, and by 2020, the rural emergency management capacity, impacted by the COVID-19 epidemic, grew very rapidly with an annual growth rate of 33.8%. (3) The development of an effective rural emergency management capacity system is not sufficient and unbalanced, which leads to the “barrel effect.” This study can provide theoretical guidelines for the evaluation of rural emergency management capabilities, and provide methodological support for similar research in other regions.

Study on the Evaluation of Emergency Management Capacity of Resilient Communities by the AHP-TOPSIS Method

Community emergency management is directly related to the safety of people's lives and properties and is concerned with economic development and social stability. This paper established an evaluation model of community emergency management capacity from the perspective of resilience based on hierarchical analysis (AHP) and distance between superior and inferior solutions (TOPSIS). In terms of infrastructure resilience, community organizational resilience, risk, and hidden danger management, emergency material security, emergency force construction, emergency literacy, and the evaluation index system of resilient community emergency management capacity were improved. By the AHP method, the weights of all indexes were determined scientifically. Combined with the TOPSIS method, the fit of the evaluated object which between the positive and negative ideal solution was calculated to determine the optimal evaluation among multiple experts. According to the validated assessment, the low-scoring indicators were analyzed to make practical suggestions for improvement. The results provide new theoretical methods and technical support for the assessment of community emergency response capacity, which also provides reference for the assessment of emergency response capacity in other fields.

Regional differences of COVID-19 pandemic prevention in China: Especially from the perspective of political leaders.

Since emergency management capabilities with respect to COVID-19 differ across different regions of China, it is necessary to adopt a more comprehensive perspective to study the reasons for these differences and propose corresponding policies. By investigating 287 prefectural-level administrative regions, this study explores the reasons for different levels of COVID-19 prevention performance. The results lead to the following conclusions. The factors influencing pandemic prevention include both structural factors, such as economic and social factors, and the experiences and characteristics of prefectural-level government leaders (party secretaries and mayors), such as grassroots work experience and level of education, which are significantly positively correlated with the progress of pandemic prevention. Based on these findings, we propose suggestions to improve governance capacity in terms of three aspects: the improvement of emergency management capacity, the appointment of cadres in the context of new challenges and missions, and the establishment collocation of prefectural-level leader teams.

The 2022 report of the MJA-Lancet Countdown on health and climate change: Australia unprepared and paying the price.

The MJA-Lancet Countdown on health and climate change in Australia was established in 2017 and produced its first national assessment in 2018 and annual updates in 2019, 2020 and 2021. It examines five broad domains: climate change impacts, exposures and vulnerability; adaptation, planning and resilience for health; mitigation actions and health co-benefits; economics and finance; and public and political engagement. In this, the fifth year of the MJA-Lancet Countdown, we track progress on an extensive suite of indicators across these five domains, accessing and presenting the latest data and further refining and developing our analyses. Within just two years, Australia has experienced two unprecedented national catastrophes - the 2019-2020 summer heatwaves and bushfires and the 2021-2022 torrential rains and flooding. Such events are costing lives and displacing tens of thousands of people. Further, our analysis shows that there are clear signs that Australia's health emergency management capacity substantially decreased in 2021. We find some signs of progress with respect to health and climate change. The states continue to lead the way in health and climate change adaptation planning, with the Victorian plan being published in early 2022. At the national level, we note progress in health and climate change research funding by the National Health and Medical Research Council. We now also see an acceleration in the uptake of electric vehicles and continued uptake of and employment in renewable energy. However, we also find Australia's transition to renewables and zero carbon remains unacceptably slow, and the Australian Government's continuing failure to produce a national climate change and health adaptation plan places the health and lives of Australians at unnecessary risk today, which does not bode well for the future.

Study on Urban Resilience from the Perspective of the Complex Adaptive System Theory: A Case Study of the Lanzhou-Xining Urban Agglomeration.

In the context of global environmental change and continuous urbanization, enhancing urban resilience is an important way to improve urban emergency management capacity and achieve sustainable development of urban systems. It is of great significance to clarify the mechanisms and effects of urban resilience and carry out resilience measurement to improve the level of urban system resilience and alleviate the pressure of environmental disturbances on the stable operation of urban systems. As an important part of the “Belt and Road” Initiative and one of the few leading economic regions in western China, promoting the high-quality development of the Lanzhou-Xining urban agglomeration is of profound significance for strengthening ethnic unity and stabilizing the northwest and southwest regions. Based on the complex adaptive system (CAS) theory and the adaptive cycle model, this study understands urban resilience as the comprehensive result of urban system stability, self-organization, learning adaptability and transformability, constructs a multi-level open index evaluation system, and analyzes the spatio-temporal evolution characteristics of urban resilience of the Lanzhou-Xining urban agglomeration from the proposed design to the formal planning in 2010–2017. The findings are as follows: (1) Research on the urban resilience of the Lanzhou-Xining urban agglomeration verifies the applicability of the evolutionary urban resilience analysis framework and makes preliminary findings on urban resilience based on CAS theory, which provide a certain theoretical reference for the research on the spatio-temporal evolution of urban resilience. (2) From 2010 to 2017, significant differences are observed between various urban attributes. Resilience exhibits an overall upward trend, and spatial evolution changes from a double core (Lanzhou and Xining) to three cores (Lanzhou, Xining and Haidong) and polycentric modes. (3) Based on urban resilience characteristics and an urban system adaptability cycle model, this paper divides the Lanzhou-Xining urban agglomeration cities into four types (exploitation–reorganization, conservation–release, conservation–exploitation and exploitation), and proposes corresponding adaptive management countermeasures. These could be adopted as a reference to promote the high-quality development of the Lanzhou-Xining urban agglomeration.