The successive changes in the structure of DRM in Iran over the past decades have shown the special attention of policy-makers to respond appropriately. Currently, responsibility for DRM lies primarily with two organizations: CDO and NDMO. The CDO operates under the command of the General Staff of the Armed Forces. Civil Defense is defined as a series of unarmed acts that reduce the vulnerability of manpower, buildings, facilities, equipment, and arteries to enemy hostile and destructive operations or reduce the risks of abnormal accidents. The NDMO is also affiliated with the MoI, with its corresponding organizational categories in the governorates. This organization was found with the aim of integrated management of policy, planning, coordination and coherence in the areas of implementation, research and monitoring various stages of DRM. The NDMO also organizes the affected areas using the facilities and capacities of ministries, institutions, public and governmental companies, banks, insurance corporations, and community- based organizations. There are 14 specialty and operational teams of representatives from various institutions within the organization, whose members follow their workgroup approvals in line with their tasks.
In the event of a disaster, one of the most important issues is the timely performance of the organizations in order to provide the best services in the coordinated space. This coordination has begun before the occurrence of hazards, and all actors in this area must establish appropriate communication with other stakeholders in accordance with their duties (8, 10, 12, 15, 17, 20, 37, 38). The stakeholders are individuals, groups, and organizations that are influenced by decisions and plans of an organization, or affect its decision-making (4). Accordingly, an analysis of the network of DRM stakeholders in Iran was conducted with 85 organizations. The appearance of the network of DRM stakeholders shows acceptable consistency with a density of 0.75. This is the strength of the network, which is necessary for planners to set up a participatory program by identifying key network entities and institutions (39). The network has three clusters that are different not only in the number of cluster members but also in the importance of the organizations within each cluster. The main node of each cluster is usually the node that has the largest number of connections to other nodes and is considered to be the core organization (30). These cores have also good connections to the nodes in other clusters.
The NDMO (30) is the main organization in the red cluster with 30 members. Other important members of this cluster include the IRCS (16), the MoHME (47), the IRIB (20), and the Universities of Medical Sciences (UMS) (14) whose dominant activity is operational. The NDMO is the main DRM organization, as well as responsive for most DRM plans in Iran. This could justify placing this organization in this cluster and with operational/executive organizations. However, considering the political position of the NDMO, it is expected to be placed in a cluster with policy-making organizations (the blue cluster in Figure 2). This could be related to the process of establishing and maintaining this organization. Approving the establishment of the NDMO by parliament in 2007 for a period of 5 years, the duration of its pilot operation was then extended by the end of 2014. The organization has continued to operate without new approval. This may put the legitimacy and power of the organization under question, undermine the role of policy-making and affect the organization’s core position in the network. It seems necessary to finalize the legal structure of this organization and clarify its responsibilities and powers, more transparently. Moreover, although NDMO (30) is categorized within the red cluster, it has very good links to the members of the two clusters representing its core role of the network.
In the blue cluster, the CDO (45) is the core organization. The members of this cluster are often major organizations such as the Ministries of Defense and Armed Forces Logistic (1), Agriculture (49), Science, Research and Technology (50), Industry, Mine and Trade (60), Petroleum (61), and Energy (62), which plays a key and effective role in DRM, especially in the phase of prevention and preparedness. Therefore, the CDO (45) has maintained its special political position. The main members of this cluster are often involved in strengthening the theoretical basis of DRM.
The third cluster has 16 members, i.e. the PBO (71), the Guardian Council (28), the General Inspection Organization (83), the MoI (3), the Municipalities and Village Administrators (40) and the City and Village Councils (41) among the most important organizations. The last two organizations are considered as subsidiaries of the MoI. In addition to important organizations in the field of politics, organizations that can be effective in financial support are also located in this cluster. The Ministry of Economic Affairs and Finance (53), Banks (7), and PBO (71) are among these organizations. The presence of these organizations, along with the policy-makers, is an ideal position for policy-making and implementation. However, there are organizations in the green cluster that are expected to be more relevant in the area of policy-making with other organizations. Therefore, it is essential that the core organizations of this cluster develop their communications in this area. The common point for the three clusters is the presence of some national organizations as the core members. This issue is considered as a good opportunity to create the necessary coordination to manage the risk of disasters in Iran, which should be used to its maximum.
To understand the role of effective organizations regarding the various roles that sectors can play in the network, we applied different centrality measurements. As mentioned earlier, the MoI (3) is the legal authority for DRM in Iran, while the NDMO (30) is a subordinate entity. In addition, the MoHME (47), the IRCS (16), and the IRIB (20) are responsible for three specialized working group Health care, the Rescue and Public Education, and the Education and Information of the NDMO (30), respectively. The main part of the DRM activities in Iran focuses on the response phase. These three organizations play the most important role in the response phase. As a result, the WOD (Figure 2-C) index compared to the WID (Figure 2-B) is higher for these organizations, which might indicate their influence and power. Nonetheless, the WID of these organizations is also desirable, which indicates the mutual importance of these organizations. In contrast, some organizations have higher WID than WOD, such as the CBOs (23), the Organization for Mobilization of the Oppressed (51), the Mobilizing the Medical Society Organization (64), and the Militia Volunteer Force (85). As these organizations are society-based and the target groups of their programs are vulnerable people, proper planning and joint programming could lead to better community-based disaster risk management. This is an opportunity to promote community resilience (2).
However, organizations including the Ministry of Education (6), private hospitals (10), Iranian Blood Transfusion Organization (55) and the International Institute of Earthquake Engineering and Seismology (11) are the ones with centrality measurements less than the average of the network. While these organizations are key members of the 14 workgroups of the NDMO, they play a significant role in the DRM cycle, especially in prevention and preparedness. Therefore, it is the duty of their core organizations in the clusters to provide some solutions and improve their operations with the appropriate organizations in the network. For example, the Ministry of Education (6), which is considered a vital infrastructure, might have a significant impact on community resilience (2). Schools have special operational capacities and play an effective role as educational poles, which could be used as evacuation places at the time of disaster (40). At the Bangkok Summit in 2007, it was suggested that disaster risk reduction should be incorporated into educational policies, to be used to promote educational systems to transfer training to the community (41). The IRCS, as the responsibility of the Public Education working group, might plan activities in this regard, using its high betweenness capacity in cooperation with the NDMO (Figure 2-D).
The lack of coping capacities of Iran is 80.35%, which is categorized among high-risk countries. In terms of vulnerability and lack of adaptive capacities, it is classified as 47.78% and 43.81% (5), respectively, which indicates Iran’s low resilience. The Organization for Mobilization of the Oppressed (51) is a governmental organization that supports vulnerable economic groups, which along with Iran’s Small Industries and Industrial Parks Organization (8), they can contribute to the improvement of these indices. Using their betweenness position, the NDMO, along with the risk-transfer capacity of the Various Insurance Organizations (36) need to strengthen the Organization for Mobilization of the Oppressed (51) towards facilitating community resilience. The Organization for Mobilization of the Oppressed (51) and the Various Insurance Organizations (36) are able to prevent the aggravation of the consequences of disasters. Indeed, achieving the Built Back Better goal in the Sendai Framework is possible through the provision of operational strategies and promoting a culture of prevention and preparedness on the “response” (2).
Since the organizations with higher eigenvector centrality have more relationship with important organizations in the network; they can use their capacity to improve the communication of isolated organizations. Moreover, organizations with high closeness are also the right option. Indeed, each of these indicators might determine the difference in the potential role of the organizations. Considering this fact, the NDMO (30), Various Insurance Organizations (36), IRCS (16), MoI (3), MoHME (47) and PBO (71) are organizations with high value in all the centrality measurements. If these key organizations properly perform their tasks and outline the organizational expectations of other stakeholders, and create the necessary coordination before the hazards occur, the quality of the response phase will also improve (42).
To examine the visual details of communications among the members of the network, we deleted weaker links sequentially. Isolated organizations that are not well-matched in their group could be easily identified. In the first step, we removed the weakest links with weights less or equal to 1 (77% or 4159 links remain). Most organizations remained in the same cluster as they were (Figures 4 A and B). The network still had a solid consistency despite the deletion of these links. Some organizations from the blue cluster were relocated to the green cluster. The members of the red cluster remained the same except the NDMO (30). Depending on the nature of the tasks, the CDO (45) continues to work with strategic and military organizations, i.e. the Ministry of Defense and Armed Forces Logistics (1), the Islamic Republic of Iran Army (81) were placed in the blue cluster.
By removing links weighing less than or equal to 2 (44% or 2358 links remain), the number of clusters increased to 4 (Figure 4-C). The blue cluster is mostly unchanged. This indicates strong communication among the members of this cluster. The other two clusters, red and green, in panels A and B in Figure 4 were subsequently rearranged and divided into three clusters. The NDMO (30) is located in the red cluster with three organizations of the PBO (71), the IRIB (20) and the MoI (3). Looking at the size of the green cluster nodes shows that these organizations have a relatively smaller WD than the other three clusters. The Climatological Research Institute (44), the Agricultural Economics Association (78), the Water Resources Management Company (68), the Geological Survey and Mineral Exploration of Iran (69), the Ministry of Agriculture (49) and others are also located in this cluster. These organizations could have joint activities in almost all areas of climate change and land use. Therefore, their placement in a cluster indicates their proper relationship with one another and could bring good results in this area in the case of joint planning and the use of this opportunity. Certainly, there is a need for organizations with high betweenness or eigenvector centralities, such as the NDMO for this coordination. This provides the communication that they need to explain the clear expectations from each of these organizations. The IRIC (16), the commissions of health in parliament (77), the MoHME (47), the UMS (14), and private hospitals (10) also have joint activities in the brown cluster in executive activities. Proper coordination between these organizations could improve the provision of services, especially in the response phase. Obviously, this coordination should take place in the form of working group meetings, joint programs, and scientific and operational exercises prior to the occurrence of the incident. Describing organizational duties and expectations, monitoring and evaluation strategies are inevitable.
In the next step, the number of clusters increased to 5 by removing links of weight less than or equal to 3 (16% or 845 links remain), Figure 4-D. The network is still connected representing that all organizations have at least some strong cooperation with organizations inside the network. We rearranged the node’s location to better present the clusters. Purple links between the two red and blue clusters appear to be significant compared to other clusters. Given the presence of the NDMO (30) and the CDO (45) in these two clusters, there is an appropriate relationship between the responsible organizations in DRM. The IRIB (20), the CBOs (23), the Friday Imams Policy Council (72) and the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance (2) are in the mustard cluster organizations. The nature of the tasks of these organizations shows that they could take effective measures to promote public awareness. In the case of proper planning, this would allow access to the first objective of the Sendai Framework, which is understanding disaster risk (2). The striking feature of this cluster is through strong but limited links with red clusters, which are in need of an upgrade. In the purple cluster, organizations involved in climate change maintained their relationship, which shows the strength and coherence of the cluster. Nevertheless, this cluster does not have an effective relationship with yellow and mustard clusters. However, tackling climate change requires education and culture (mustard cluster) measures to prevent and deal with the consequences. The UMS (14), Jahd-e Daneshgahi (13), the MoHME (47), and the commission of health in parliaments (77) are the most important yellow cluster organizations that can play key roles in climate change. Therefore, it is necessary for the NDMO to strengthen its role in facilitating communication between these clusters.
In the last step, links with a weight of less than or equal to 4 (6% or 334 links remain) were deleted (Figure 4-E). Following this, despite the fact that the number of clusters did not change the association of eight organizations was completely interrupted by the network. The disfigured organizations included: Iran Small Industries and Industrial Parks Organization (8), the Islamic Revolution Housing Foundation (9), the Ministry of Education (6), and the Ministry of Industry, Mining and Trade (60). Despite their undeniable role in this area, they can challenge DRM if there is no plan to enhance their communication, especially for prevention. Because according to the Sendai Framework, it is necessary to communicate and cooperate closely with stakeholders, including indigenous people, volunteers, and owners of the professions, for designing and implementing policies, programs and standards (2).
The members of the mustard cluster were active in the military field. This cluster has almost no relation to the purple cluster and is most closely related to the blue cluster. In the blue cluster, the CDO (45) remains the most important organization, while most of the mustard cluster communication is with this organization. Investigating the blue cluster links indicates there is a strong and logical connection between its organizations, which might be very effective in tackling climate change. For example, the link between the organizations of the Ministry of Agriculture (49) and the Iranian Agricultural Economics Society (78) or the relationship between the Iran Water Resources Management (68) and the Ministry of Agriculture (49) and the Climatological Research Institute (44) is fully comprehensible and is the positive point in this cluster. The high WID of the CDO (45) in this cluster is also a strong point, and reviewing the links confirms the authority of this organization among the four other clusters. The NDMO (30) has nearly similar conditions with CDO (45) in the green cluster. However, the CDO (45) receives most of its communication from the mustard cluster, while the NDMO (30) receives links from all clusters in a balanced fashion. As a result, this organization can facilitate the association of the CDO (45) with other stakeholders. Red cluster members are almost all active in the field of health and have good connections with each other. In this cluster, the PBO (71), the Ministry of Cooperatives, Labor and Social Welfare (48) and the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Finance (53) are the organizations expected to play a more effective role in DRM, especially the pre-occurrence of hazards. However, it seems they are almost isolated in the current situation. The political status of these organizations has an important role to play in this area, rendering it to become more involved in this field, for instance through trustee organizations such as the NDMO (30). Despite the change of the network, Figure 4 shows that the NDMO (30), the CDO (45), the Presidential Center for Strategic Studies (66), the MoHME (47), the Ministry of Defense and Armed Forces Logistic (1) retained their status in all five stages of removal of links. In short, it could be concluded that the strength of the DRM network in Iran is the presence of cohesion clusters, in which particular groups work with their members and in parallel cooperate with members in other groups. The group that works on a larger scale can improve the performance of DRM. Moreover, the presence of multiple core organizations spread across all clusters shows that there is not a single core organization responsible for the entire management of disasters. Nevertheless, the NDMO and CDO could theoretically play the role of main cores in the network. Multi-core network help reduce the time performance of the system when a disaster happens and let the organizations get coherent in a shorter time period. The other important fact is the key role of national organizations. The findings also showed that despite the high density in the network, there are weaknesses in the communications of some organizations. It can be expected that tangible upgrades could be achieved if network communications of DRM stakeholders are improved.