ABSTRACT
This chapter deals with the development of emergency management in the United States and specifically the creation and changes that occurred within the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) from its inception in 1979 through the middle 1990s. It discusses the factors that plagued FEMA through the 1980s and into the early 1990s, including its near extinction at the hands of Congress, and its eventual resurrection under the leadership of James Lee Witt. The chapter examines Witt’s development of a network organizational system for emergency management that successfully established a partnership between federal, state, and local governments to deal with emergency management. The network perspective worked, and significant improvements were made in emergency management systems and disaster response. The chapter also examines the changes to emergency management that have occurred as a result of the election of 2008 and discuss the likelihood of their success in improving emergency management in the near future.
