Interactive Subjects,Collaborative Space And Tool Selection

In addition to natural disasters,industrialization,globalization and urbanization are also the processes in which risk society is formed.A variety of sudden natural and social disasters occur frequently.Dealing with and responding to these sudden events becomes an important criterion of measuring government's public management ability.Nonetheless,no matter in terms of resources or ability,government is confronted by the challenge of infinite requirements while responding to these unexpected disasters,which drives the government to find a "helper" in the space outside the government system.Thus,social organizations become important synergies of disaster governance.In the practice of disaster governance,the type of social organizations that rely on ideas,technology,and funds to participate in disaster governance began to emerge,and formed an interactive relation with the government,to which the academic community has not paid adequate attention yet.Hence,how to understand and interpret the interaction between government and social organizations in disaster governance is necessary and urgent.In the literature,relevant research on this topic can be found in the discussion of disaster governance and that of political and social relations.These two types of literature have many ideas and opinions on further understanding and interpreting the relationship between government and social organizations in disaster governance.However,researches on disaster governance ignore the spatial characteristics of disaster per se,while researches on political and social relations ignore the “fragmentation” of the government in the interaction.In other words,the role and function of government and social organizations in disaster governance is distinct and different.The government plays the role of institutionalized supplier of the disaster governance system,the differentiated actors in the process,and the organizational coordinator among the disaster governance entities.By contrast,social organizations function in popularizing and promoting the knowledge of disaster prevention and mitigation,integrating and mobilizing the capital and human resources,carrying out and improve the disaster relief and the rescue work.Therefore,the role of the government and the functions of social organization intersect and complement each other in disaster governance,together they constitute the function network of disaster governance.We establish the “interactive subject-collaborative space-tool selection” analysis framework on the existing literature,in order to reveal the interaction between government and social organizations in disaster governance.The analysis of institutional structure find that the interaction between government and social organizations in disaster governance is characterized by multi-agent interactive network,organizational coordination of the whole process and the use of institutionalized tools,which reflects the design of an idealized political-social interaction.Through the empirical analysis of the interaction between government and society in disaster governance,the interaction between the two is expressed as the following: multi-network focus under service supply,shrinking and expanding under the imbalance of resource structure,and multi-modal interaction under the defect of demand side.The reason why the analysis of the empirical and mechanism is different from that of the institutional structure lies in the existence of three key mechanisms: service supply,imbalanced resource structure and defects of the demand side.The existence of these three mechanisms makes the relationship between government and social organizations in disaster governance change from the design of the institutional structure to the adaptation to the actual situation.Based on the discussion and application of the “interactive subject-collaborative space-tool selection” analysis framework,suggestions from two perspectives are made.From the viewpoint of policy response,the government needs to establish an effective communication and connection mechanism between political and social organizations;optimize the policy environment for the founding,development and growth of disaster relief social organizations,and social organizations also need to find their own hematopoietic function;in the choice of tools,the government not only needs to optimize the purchase service system,but also clarify the applicable conditions of various policy tools.From the perspective of theoretical response,the interaction between government and social organizations in disaster governance should be structuralized as interactive subject,coordination space and tool selection.Meanwhile,it can be found that the interaction between government and social organizations in disaster governance is deeply affected by the interactive subjects,disaster synergy space,and government's tools.Different interaction subjects,collaborative space and government tools will generate different political and social interactions,which is different from the general perception.