Mapping and Prioritizing Barriers to Timely Rural Recovery Affected by Hurricanes

Abstract

Hurricanes pose increasingly severe threats to rural communities, where recovery faces unique challenges due to geographic isolation, limited infrastructure, and socioeconomic vulnerabilities that amplify postdisaster impacts. Although extensive literature documents numerous barriers to rural recovery, critical gaps persist in understanding how these barriers interact and which should be prioritized. This study employs a mixed-method approach integrating systematic literature review, expert validation, and social network analysis (SNA) to identify, classify, and prioritize 52 barriers affecting posthurricane recovery in rural communities. Through a comprehensive analysis of 171 publications complemented by expert interviews, barriers were categorized into 10 attributes. The reviewed publications were further organized into four document categories: detailed discussions, qualitative analyses, frameworks, and mathematical models. Reference and adjacency matrices were developed for each category, enabling computation of centrality measures, primarily degree of centrality, supplemented by closeness, betweenness, and eigenvector metrics, to quantify barrier interconnectedness and influence. Results revealed that gender and minority discrimination, unclear or weak policies, lack of proper planning and preparedness, lack of education, and lack of income sources emerge as consistently central barriers across all analytical categories. This study concluded with a seven-level hierarchical conceptual framework that systematically prioritizes barriers based on their centrality and interconnectedness. The findings of this study provide actionable insights for decision makers by identifying the most influential and interconnected barriers affecting rural posthurricane recovery and support strategic resource allocation, rural-focused policy development, and timely recovery procedure.