Coordination is important in engineering and construction projects; but it becomes critical in crisis situations such as recovery and reconstruction after a natural disaster. Due to its criticality and influence on post-disaster outcomes, this Master Thesis aims to understand how organizations structure and coordinate post-disaster infrastructure reconstruction by analyzing post-disaster project coordination networks over time.
While immediate coordination among organizations involved in the post-disaster response stage is already well theorized by literature, there is a dearth of information about the evolution of coordination response in the later recovery stages. This research aims to address this gap by combining theories of coordination and Social Network Analysis (SNA) in order to visualize and analyze coordination between organizations.
Data will be collected through online survey questionnaires administered to organizations providing infrastructure projects within 20 local communities (barangays) in the Philippines, and coordination networks will be built and analyzed using SNA for two specific time periods after the disaster (6 months and 1 year). SNA models relationships between actors and depicts the structure of a group through mathematical methods. Moreover, the collection of network data across two time frames will allow for analysis of networks over time. This data will be validated with responses from field interviews and notes.
This Master Thesis is integrated into a broader study conducted by the University of Colorado at Boulder (USA). The ultimate goal of studying coordination amongst stakeholder participation and training in post-disaster reconstruction is to highlight pathways leading to resilient and sustainable infrastructure systems. Findings will be disseminated to participating organizations and submitted for publication in peer-reviewed journals.
Lepropre, F. (2015). "How do Organizations Structure and Coordinate Post-Disaster Infrastructure Reconstruction over Time?" Thesis, Haute Ecole Leonard de Vinci.