Article written by Carter T. Butts, Ryan M. Acton, and 2007 DPDF The Political Economy of Redistribution Fellow Christopher S. Marcum, featured in the Journal of Social Structure, Volume 13:

In this paper, we employ archival materials from multiple institutional sources to reconstruct
the dynamic network of interorganizational collaboration that emerged in response to the Hurricane
Katrina disaster of late 2005. Over the period from initial storm formation through the first
week following landfall in Louisiana, we record active participation by over 1,500 organizations
in response activities. We here conduct an exploratory analysis of the growth and evolution of
the network of collaboration among responding organizations, an identification of organizations
that emerged as central actors in the response process, and the cohesive subgroups that crystallized
within the larger network. Finally, we conclude with a discussion of several issues related
to the use of archival methods in research on interorganizational networks in disaster settings,
and to the use of automated methods for network extraction.