Self‐organization's responses to the COVID‐19 pandemic in China

Self‐organization was a key informal channel used to fight COVID‐19 in Wuhan when the local government and other formal organizations failed to respond in the very early stages of the pandemic. The present study aims to investigate the effectiveness of self‐organization during an emergency from both a demand‐driven and a social mission identity perspective. Using 14 cases, this study examines the lifecycles of self‐organization in alignment with the consistent changes in social demands. Volunteers' social mission identity and a flexible organizational structure have been identified as two major attributes of the outstanding performance of self‐organization. Moreover, self‐organization demonstrates a striking feature of noncontiguous service provision with the assistance of social media. This study extends the literature on the changing roles of governments and civil society to the emergency context.