A resource‐based view of green innovation as a strategic firm resource: Present status and future directions

TLDR

Green innovation can serve as a strategic resource that offers competitive advantage while promoting sustainable development, yet systematic studies of its structure and future research directions remain scarce. The study aims to explain the sustainable‑development dilemma of green innovation through a resource‑based view by conducting a comprehensive bibliometric analysis of 951 articles and outlining future research agendas. Using bibliographic coupling, citation and co‑authorship analyses, dynamic co‑citation tracking, and content analysis, the authors map the literature and identify key contributors and thematic evolution. The analysis reveals four major research themes—green supply chain management, green product design, corporate environmental responsibilities, and social sustainability—and highlights influential articles, keyword co‑occurrence patterns, and directions for future work.

Abstract

Abstract Green innovation could become a valuable firm resource for establishing competitive advantage while simultaneously contributing towards sustainable development; in other words, green innovation has the potential to address the dilemma between consuming available resources and preserving them for the future. However, there is a dearth of studies systematically examining the present structure and future scope of research on green innovation as a firm resource. Seeking to explain the sustainable development dilemma of green innovations through the theoretical perspective of the resource‐based view of the firm, we address this gap with a comprehensive bibliometric analysis of 951 relevant articles. The key contributors to the extant literature are recognised with bibliographic coupling, citation analysis and co‐authorship analysis. A co‐citation analysis identifies four major thematic areas of research: green supply chain management, green product design, corporate environmental responsibilities and social sustainability. Further, a dynamic co‐citation analysis tracks the progression of these thematic areas. Content analysis of the thematic areas provides insights into the status of the research domain. This study also contributes to the extant literature by identifying prestigious articles on green innovation as a firm resource, analysing the co‐occurrence of keywords and suggesting future research agendas.