Who collaborates on urban resilience? An analysis of flood resilience planning networks in four coastal cities

Cities are increasingly focused on building resilience. The literature on urban resilience governance emphasizes the importance of breaking down organizational silos and fostering collaboration between diverse actors. Yet few studies empirically examine whether existing resilience governance networks possess these theorized characteristics. This paper addresses this gap by focusing on flood resilience governance in four major U.S. cities and uses social network analysis to analyze the collaboration structures of organizations involved in resilience building efforts. Drawing on original survey data, results suggest that resilience governance is multi-level, with city, regional, state, and federal government organizations present in all city networks. The networks are also diverse, with nonprofit organizations, private firms, and educational or research institutions prominently featured. While these results are promising in terms of the potential for resilience to diversify participation in decision-making, we also find low levels of network density, meaning that the networks are generally sparsely connected. This suggests that the network is susceptible to fragmentation if organizations defect from the network.