Patterns of preference and practice: bridging actors in wildfire response networks in the American Northwest

Abstract

The roles of bridging actors in emergency response networks can be important to disaster response outcomes. This paper is based on an evaluation of wildfire preparedness and response networks in 21 large-scale wildfire events in the wildland-urban interface near national forests in the American Northwest. The study investigated how key individuals in responder networks anticipated seeking out specific people in perceived bridging roles prior to the occurrence of wildfires, and then captured who in fact assumed these roles during actual large-scale events. It examines two plausible, but contradictory, bodies of theory-similarity and dissimilarity-that suggest who people might seek out as bridgers and who they would really go to during a disaster. Roughly one-half of all pre-fire nominations were consistent with similarity. Yet, while similarity is a reliable indicator of how people expect to organise, it does not hold up for how they organise during the real incident.

Is Vulnerability an Outdated Concept? After Subjects and Spaces

“…However, it is the local responders who require and are given training to become fluent in the esoteric language, procedures, and regulations in the system (see Faas et al. ).…”

Enduring Cooperation: Time, Discipline, and Minga Practice in Disaster-induced Displacement and Resettlement in the Ecuadorian Andes

“…Disaster and resettlement also thrust those affected into contact-novel or amplified-with a bevy of formal organizations promising aid and recovery. The operations of these supralocal organizations often disrupt local networks and adaptive practices and, whether the consequence of activism, experience, or formal after-action review, humanitarian organizations have become increasingly aware of the merits of realizing operational objectives in culturally-sensitive coordination with local efforts (Faas 2017;Faas et al 2016). This calls anthropological attention both to the persistent question of how social support networks survive risks inherent in disasters and resettlement (Faas 2015) and to the matter of how these practices are transformed when they become globalized as extensions of state and multinational processes of disaster mitigation, resettlement, and development.…”

Cross-Sector Emergency Information Networks on Social Media: Online Bridging and Bonding Communication Patterns

“…Nohrstedt (2018a) points out each incident “represents a unique combination of severity, geographical, and functional scope” (p. 530). Therefore, the needs of responders vary and may be different from they anticipated during their planning processes (Faas, Velez, FitzGerald, Nowell, & Steelman, 2017; Jung, Song, & Feiock, 2017). To integrate and organize effectively within these diverse networks, participants make decisions about where to go for information and with whom to interact.…”

“…In short, bonding strategies pool resources and reinforce group norms, and bridging strategies facilitate access to resources and information across a diverse set of actors (Aldrich, 2012; Andrew & Carr, 2013; Faas et al, 2017). Both are needed in emergency management.…”

“…Both are needed in emergency management. And both are supported by preincident relationship building (Hu et al, 2014; Johnson, Goerdel, Lovrich, & Pierce, 2015; Kapucu, 2006; Kapucu & Hu, 2016; Moynihan, 2009; Nohrstedt, 2018b; Nowell & Steelman, 2015), although organizations may deviate from those relationships depending on their situations (Bodin & Nohrstedt, 2016; Faas et al, 2017; Jung et al, 2017; Kapucu & Demiroz, 2011). The key task is to balance those approaches depending on organizational and community needs (Wukich & Robinson, 2013).…”