When hazards don’t make law

Structural resonance in global disaster-law diffusion, 1960–2025

Bibliographic Data

ID24029520
AuthorsMaoxin Ye (0000-0003-2542-7230, Department of Sociology, School of Humanities , Southeast University 2 Southeast University Road, Jiangning District, Nanjing City, Jiangsu Province), Daniel P Aldrich (0000-0002-4150-995X, Department of Political Science and Policy School , Northeastern University 215H Renaissance Park, 360 Huntington Avenue, Boston, MA)
Year2026
Publication date2026-08-17
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueSocial Forces (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0037-7732 • E-ISSN: 1534-7605
PublisherOxford University Press (OUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1093/sf/soag109
OpenAlexW7203653882
LanguageEN
References cited47

This article asks why states adopt comprehensive national disaster laws. Rather than treating legislation as an automatic response to hazard exposure, we conceptualize disaster-law adoption as a process of structural resonance: regional diffusion pressures become consequential when they align with domestic governance needs and administrative capacity. Using a new country-year dataset of first adoptions across 204 states and territories from 1960 to 2025, we estimate Cox proportional hazards models with multiple imputation. Recent hazard exposure predicts adoption only in simpler specifications and loses significance once diffusion and state-structure variables are introduced. Regional adoption share strongly accelerates first adoption. Decentralization and government accountability are also associated with earlier enactment, and regional diffusion is amplified in more decentralized polities. The findings show that disaster legalization is not simply a functional response to risk. It is a sociological process in which external legal templates gain force where domestic authority is fragmented and the demand for administrative coordination is high.

Accountability · Corporate governance · Decentralization · Government (linguistics) · Hazard · Legalization · Legislation · Process (computing) · Disaster Management and Resilience · Policy Transfer and Learning · Public Policy and Administration Research

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