Visualizing sustainability research in business and management (1990–2019) and emerging topics: A large-scale bibliometric analysis
Visualizing sustainability research in business and management (1990–2019) and emerging topics: A large-scale bibliometric analysis
While researchers from many disciplines are increasingly interested in studying issues related to sustainability, few studies have presented a holistic view of sustainability from the perspectives of business and management. This bibliometric study quantitatively analyzed a big data set of 30 years of sustainability research (1990–2019), consisting of 37,322 publications and 1,199,398 cited references, visualizing major topics, dynamic evolution, and emerging development. The decade-by-decade in-depth analysis shows a clear shift from a nearly exclusive focus on economic growth and consumption to all three pillars of sustainability, i.e., economic growth, social development, and environmental protection. Highlighting the differences between United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals and the popular research topics from academia, our analysis uncovers research gaps and suggests future research directions for sustainability researchers and practitioners.
Jia, Qiong
00933f90-5f8d-41c1-9862-cd5517877ae1
Wei, Liyuan
a5ebeff3-eeac-454f-b349-3ac5e50e71f1
Li, Xiaotong
a0a58040-f0a1-4b41-a0bc-d9786df392d9
11 October 2019
Jia, Qiong
00933f90-5f8d-41c1-9862-cd5517877ae1
Wei, Liyuan
a5ebeff3-eeac-454f-b349-3ac5e50e71f1
Li, Xiaotong
a0a58040-f0a1-4b41-a0bc-d9786df392d9
Jia, Qiong, Wei, Liyuan and Li, Xiaotong
(2019)
Visualizing sustainability research in business and management (1990–2019) and emerging topics: A large-scale bibliometric analysis.
Sustainability, 11 (20), [5596].
(doi:10.3390/su11205596).
Abstract
While researchers from many disciplines are increasingly interested in studying issues related to sustainability, few studies have presented a holistic view of sustainability from the perspectives of business and management. This bibliometric study quantitatively analyzed a big data set of 30 years of sustainability research (1990–2019), consisting of 37,322 publications and 1,199,398 cited references, visualizing major topics, dynamic evolution, and emerging development. The decade-by-decade in-depth analysis shows a clear shift from a nearly exclusive focus on economic growth and consumption to all three pillars of sustainability, i.e., economic growth, social development, and environmental protection. Highlighting the differences between United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals and the popular research topics from academia, our analysis uncovers research gaps and suggests future research directions for sustainability researchers and practitioners.
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sustainability-11-05596-v3
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Accepted/In Press date: 8 October 2019
Published date: 11 October 2019
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Local EPrints ID: 494700
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/494700
ISSN: 2071-1050
PURE UUID: 087fec2c-ec31-42e8-95c9-11f10ee45c16
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Date deposited: 14 Oct 2024 16:42
Last modified: 14 Nov 2024 03:09
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Author:
Qiong Jia
Author:
Liyuan Wei
Author:
Xiaotong Li
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