Visualization of the Global Supply Chain Research Domain Through Bibliometric Analysis

Over the past three decades, it has become clear that supply chain networks have surpassed borders and expanded significantly in the international arena. The effects of this transformation have been the subject of many academic studies . The aim of this study is to understand how the domain knowledge of global supply chain literature has grown and evolved over time. Through co-citation analysis using CiteSpace software, a literature cognitive map has been extracted and hotspot topics, emerging trends and burst cited articles have been discovered in this map. The secondary data (including 653 research papers and 18,197 references) used in the analysis was retrieved from the Web of Science database. The results indicate that the sub-topics “greenhouse gas emission”, “corporate social responsibility” and “fair-trade labeling scheme” are new emerging trends in research of global supply chains. Also, the research focus has been sliding from cost reduction – profit maximization issues towards environmental and social issues under the sustainable supply chain management theory. Our study aims to provide a better understanding of current problems in the global supply chain area and lead to future research.