Fostering emergent resilience: the complex adaptive supply network of disaster relief

The frequency and intensity of disasters continue to increase. Following large-scale and catastrophic disasters, local organisations integrate with other responding organisations to form hastily disaster relief supply chain networks. Such supply networks are infrequently activated in a single location, generate unparalleled uncertainty, change quickly, and are driven by the urgency of saving lives and restoring livelihoods. Unfortunately, even where sound supply chain management practices are used, supply networks have encountered diverse levels of resilience and adequate disaster relief performance has remained elusive. In this paper, several unique characteristics that disaster relief efforts exhibit are examined as compared with demand-driven, steady-state supply chains. Important differences in the flows of resource, money, and information are identified. A complex adaptive supply network (CASN) lens is used to frame what existing literature has uncovered regarding disaster relief efforts, showing how relief organisations, their interactions, and their environmental context help determine the level of resilience that supply networks experience following disasters. This CASN characterisation is leveraged to help explain why traditional supply chain management practices lead to varied results in disaster relief. Finally, complexity science theory is drawn on to set forth eight testable propositions that may help to enhance supply network resilience.