Do Political Similarities Facilitate Interlocal Collaboration?

• Author: Hyung Jun Park,Kyujin Jung,Minsun Song
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/puar.12887
• Date: 01 March 2018
• Published date: 01 March 2018

Do Political Similarities Facilitate Interlocal Collaboration? 261

Public Administration Review,

Vol. 78, Iss. 2, pp. 261–269. © 2017 by

The American Society for Public Administration.

DOI: 10.1111/puar.12887.

Kyujin Jung is assistant professor in

the College of Liberal Arts and associate

director of the Social Disaster and

Safety Management Center at Korea

University. He has performed grant

research projects funded by the National

Science Foundation, IBM Center for the

Business of Government, and Seoul

Institute, to investigate interorganizational

collaboration. His research has appeared

in Public Administration Review,

Urban Affairs Review, Government

Information Quarterly

,

and Quality &

Quantity . His research interests include

interorganizational arrangements, social

network analysis, and issues related to

emergency management.

E-mail: kjung1@korea.ac.kr

Hyung Jun Park is associate professor

in the Department of Public Administration

and the Graduate School of Governance

at Sungkyunkwan University in Korea. His

research on policy network, policy analysis,

collaborative governance, economic

development, regulatory policies other

topics has been published in Urban Affairs

Review, Public Administration Review

,

Public Management Review

,

American

Review of Public Administration, and

Korean academic journals. He received his

PhD at Florida State University in 2005.

E-mail: hjpark72@skku.edu

Minsun Song is visiting assistant

professor in the School of Public Policy and

Leadership at the University of Nevada,

Las Vegas. She earned her PhD at Florida

State University in 2016. Her research

focuses on issues related to emergency

management, collaborative networks, and

local governance.

E-mail: minsun.song@unlv.edu

Abstract: This research examines the extent to which political similarities—that is, homophily between political

actors at the local level—affect patterns of interorganizational collaboration in an emergency response situation. While

the field of emergency management has focused on implementation-oriented arrangements among key stakeholders,

few studies have systemically investigated the creation and development of interorganizational collaborations led

by political actors, especially following catastrophic events. The analysis reveals that a dyadic tie with political

homophily boosts local responders’ ties with other agencies during emergencies. Findings indicate that political

solidarity, formulated by chief elected officials of municipalities and council members, can broaden the scope of

interorganizational collaboration by mitigating institutional collective action problems at the local level. This research

presents a critical recommendation for emergency managers that interlocal collaboration for timely response to a

disaster is attributable to political similarities that facilitate frequent interlocal interactions through formal and/or

informal agreements .

Evidence for Practice

• Collaboration mechanisms embedded in political homophily matter, highlighting the important managerial

aspects played by mayors and representatives.

• Political similarities are important not only for enhancing a strong commitment but also for reducing the

risks associated with interorganizational collaboration.

• With the increasing number of joint response operations, mayors and representatives need to consider

political homogeneities that are suitable to meet interlocal interests and policy preferences.

Minsun Song

University of Nevada , Las Vegas

Hyung Jun Park

Sungkyunkwan University

Kyujin Jung

Korea University

Do Political Similarities Facilitate Interlocal Collaboration?

D espite a corpus of empirical and theoretical

studies on interorganizational networks,

hypotheses about how similarities among

actors, such as sociodemographic or geographic

features or political homogeneity, can influence

networks remain less explored (Comfort, Waugh, and

Cigler 2012; Kapucu, Augustin, and Garayev 2009 ;

Shrestha 2013 ). Homogenous actors are more likely

to ensure network ties than heterogeneous actors

(Gerber, Henry, and Lubell 2013 ). This similarity

characteristic among actors, referred to as homophily,

has been identified as a critical determinant of

interlocal collaboration in other policy arenas (Gerber,

Henry, and Lubell 2013 ; McPherson, Smith-Lovin,

and Cook 2001 ).

Theoretical inquir y into political homophily is rare in

emergency management compared with other policy

areas. Collaboration among fragmented authorities

is associated with the policy problems that are being

addressed, the economic gains for participants, and

the nature of the disasters (Gerber, Henry, and Lubell

2013 ). Although the creation and development of

interorganizational collaboration, led by political

actors as decision makers, is regarded as significant, it

has hardly been investigated in emergency contexts.

Rather, it has been considered a part of systematic

implementation. This article will assess this crucial

form of political homophily (i.e., the extent to which

participants with similar political ideologies are more

likely to collaborate).

Institutional collective action (ICA) dilemmas

emerge from fragmented authority. These are cases

in which actors weigh the potential transaction

costs of interaction and the benefits of collaboration

(Feiock 2009 , 2013 ; Feiock and Scholz 2010 ). In

creating multifunctional and multilayered emergency

networks, local government officials overseeing

governmental agencies consider the consequences of

interorganizational collaboration, but the partisan

aspects of decision making may differ depending

on political ideologies (Gerber, Henry, and Lubell

2013 ). In creating interorganizational ties across local