Urban Waste: Visualizing the Academic Literature through Bibliometric Analysis and Systematic Review

Abstract

The management of solid urban waste is one of the biggest problems currently faced by society and the economy. It can be considered a negative externality that arises as a consequence of the production and consumption processes of industry and society. This study consists of a bibliometric analysis to recognize the articles published and included in high-impact scientific journals, as well as a systematic review of the literature. We have collected 1897 research articles from the Scopus database that have been published between 1981 and 2021. We have identified the main subject areas, authors, institutions, and countries of these publications, as well as research trends in terms of resource management. Our findings show that since the 20th century, there has been quantitative and qualitative growth in this line of research, especially since 2006, and that four main trends have been defined: environment, society, technical aspects, and economic aspects. The economic field makes reference to the circular economy and its link to the objectives and sustainable development goals of the 2030 agenda, in which there is an important need to provide solutions to the problems generated as a consequence of the inadequate management of solid waste.

Corporate social responsibility reports: A review of the evolution, approaches and prospects

“…To carry out this analysis based on the concepts of communication, CSR and reporting, the main elements of the interactions between these concepts are determined and analyzed, and the metadata and trends available in the different databases that reflect the line of research are presented [ [34] , [35] , [36] ]. For the visualization of the keyword network maps and international cooperation networks, the statistical software VOSviewer v.1.6.18 was used, as it has been widely applied in different fields of research [ [37] , [38] , [39] , [40] ].…”

“…Additionally, the exponential growth experienced between 2014 and 2015 was motivated by the approval of Directive 2014/95/UE and the United Nations 2030 Agenda, which has helped companies to see CSR as a business strategy to achieve sustainability. Other bibliometric studies in other areas of knowledge have already shown how regulation usually leads to the generation of greater scientific production [ 36 , [38] , [39] , [40] , 58 , 103 ].…”

Implementing Circular Economy Elements in the Textile Industry: A Bibliometric Analysis

“…This enables the discovery of field trends, pinpoints impactful research, and uncovers prospective collaboration networks. The decision to use bibliometric analysis over other methodologies is based on its potential to provide a more data-driven, comprehensive, and objective view of the state of research in our chosen topic [44,45]. Our search was designed to explore literature trends related to the textile industry, circular economy, and sustainability.…”

Public–Private Partnership (PPP) in Road Infrastructure Projects: A Review of Evolution, Approaches, and Prospects

“…Callon et al (1986) argue that the number of publications in a specific period can measure research activity [40]. The evaluation of indicators allows us to understand the quantitative evolution and research topic's structure [41]. The total period of 30 years has been subdivided into six subperiods of 5 years each (Table 2).…”