Exploring the Potential Opportunities of China’s Environmental Agenda, Ecological Civilization, on Global Sustainable Development

Abstract

Ecological civilization is an important paradigm proposed by China in the context of growing local environmental challenges. The application of ecological civilization may have a spillover effect on the globe. To understand how the paradigm is interpreted by the international academic community and its Chinese counterpart, a bibliometric map of related articles published between 2000 and 2019 was mapped according to the identities of the collected Chinese and international bibliographies (9196 in CNKI and 664 in WoS). The keyword frequency statistics confirm that the concept of ecological civilization has been frequently connected to visions of sustainable development within and outside of China. The chronology of publication numbers and keyword bursts indicated that the studies related to ecological civilization have gained significant traction in China due to official support and the subjects of the research are sensitive to the change in leadership. The much lower publication number of international studies and China-centered co-authored studies indicate that the international community is less enthusiastic about ecological civilization. This may become a barrier to fostering consensus about international collaboration on mutually beneficial sustainable development. Based on the keyword burst analysis, this study is the first to reveal that green development is currently a shared interest in China and internationally in the literature on ecological civilization; international collaboration pursuing green development may be a path to realize global sustainable development goals. Further systemic review of the contents of individual research may need to be conducted to confirm and refine the findings of this bibliometric analysis.

1. Introduction

Sustainable development challenges are multi-scalar and require international collaboration [1,2]. This is reflected in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) composed and advocated by the United Nations (UN) related to energy and resource consumptions (SDG 7 and 12), climate actions (SDG 13), and ecosystem protection (SDG 14 and 15), with collaboration and partnership explicitly emphasized in SDG 17. Energy consumption (SDG 7) has strong links with industrial production patterns (SDG 12). For example, with carbon credits being promoted and implemented (to mitigate climate change, SDG 13), new energy generation processes (related to SDG 7) need to be considered when sustainable industrial production (SDG 12) is pursued across nations and regions. Some ecosystems (for example, marine ecosystems or a large river systems) are transboundary; therefore, the protection of the systems and the sustainable use of natural resources (SDG 14 and SDG 15) will ultimately need to be negotiated to research the consensus for implementation. With these aspects in mind, as one of the world’s most populous nations and a major driver of global production as well as consumption, the domestic environmental policy of China inevitably affects global efforts to achieve the SDGs mentioned above, in the area of carbon reduction and environmental protection.

Internally, China has undergone a paradigm shift in its ideology and policy towards development from economy-driven to environmentally conscious. Historically, the nation has faced the negative environmental impacts internally left by its speedy economic growth and urbanization since the “reform and opening up” policy of 1978 [3]. In response, the Chinese central government put forward the concept of “ecological civilization” in 2007 at the 17th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (NCCPC) [4]. Since then, the ecological civilization construct has been a major strategy aimed at addressing the challenges China faces regarding its resources and environment [5]. Written into China’s constitution in 2018, it has become the ideological framework for legislation, policy-making, and environmental education [6] at all administrative levels. As such, the ecological civilization construct has had a far-reaching impact on China’s social structure, its people’s livelihoods, and interactions with the global community [7]. Chronologically, the concept of ecological civilization could refer to both an ideological stance that the Chinese government vows to follow in policy making as well as implementation, and a unique set of Chinese policies. Considering the potential impact of China’s domestic policy on the globe, a comprehensive assessment of how the concept has been perceived in China and internationally may be meaningful to identify the shared objectives between the ecological civilization agenda and the SDGs declared by the UN, for both consensus building and future international collaborations in policy, practice, and research.

1.1. The Development of the Ecological Civilization Concept

Historically, the notion of “ecological civilization” was first put forward by Fetscher, a German political scientist and Marxist scholar, who defined it as “the dialectics of progress and reflection on industrial civilization [8], p. 170.” This concept was later developed and promoted by Chinese scholars [9]. In 1987, Ye Qianji, a Chinese eco-agriculture scholar, focused the definition of the concept within a Chinese context for the first time in the National Symposium on Ecological Agriculture, and proposed “vigorously constructing ecological civilization” [10]. At the time, ecological civilization was redefined as the process whereby humanity transforms and protects nature, and while pursuing such a style of development, humanity benefits from nature and benefits nature [10,11]. “Ecological civilization” did not come to public attention as a government policy until the release of the Report of the 17th NCCPC [7], delivered by Hu Jintao, then President of China, making its presence felt across China. The Report associated “ecology” with “conservation”, and made pursuing sustainable development a top priority for China by improving energy conservation and natural resource management [12]. During Xi Jinping’s tenure, ecological civilization has gained further prominence as a guideline for China’s goal of sustainable development.

As Chinese government has made the concept of ecological civilization from a dialectic tool into a policy to be practiced, to make the concept more implementable in various aspects of development, attempts have been made to further interpret the concept based on official statements and pre-existing academic studies. For example, Hu (2014) [13] interprets ecological civilization from four dimensions: the wide participation of all people (agents); the relationship between various types of ecosystem (objects); its realization by means of education, planning, institution, as well as technology based on available funding (means); and the need to be promoted at global, national, regional, and community levels (scopes). Liu et al. (2018) [14] state that “ecological civilization” embodies a human–nature relationship that yields positive economic, environmental, and social outcomes, necessitates eco-friendly industrial production, and benefits us and the generations to come.

On the other hand, Goron (2018) [15], a western political scientist, whose research centers on environmental politics with a specific focus on China, considers ecological civilization as a theory of sustainability that is politically constrained. Similarly, Marinelli (2018) [12], specializing in Chinese studies and politics, notes that ecological civilization is “political rhetoric” that aspires to a framework beyond industrial civilization and the realization of ecological prosperity. He further indicates that the introduction of this concept from the Chinese government reshapes China’s development matrix and redirects the nation away from an obsession with GDP growth as an assessment of development towards a greater focus on living standards, social wellbeing, and environmental conservation. Marinelli (2018) [12] views ecological civilization as, heuristically, a departure from the conventional logic of economic growth and, to some extent, as an inspiration to decision-makers and the general public to revise the core purpose of pursuing economic growth and societal development.

The prominence attached to ecological civilization in China has attracted international attention. UNEP (2016) [16] expects China’s efforts to promote this concept to contribute significantly to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The application of the concept could help address the nation’s challenges in resource utilization and environmental protection, and demonstrate to other developing countries that sustainable development is feasible and compatible with national social and economic objectives. Geall and Ely (2018) [17] note that ecological civilization constructed in the Chinese context signals the nation’s commitment to “green transformation”. However, internationally, some scholars have cast a critical eye on this development. Hansen, Li, and Svarverud (2018) [7] (p. 201) argue that ecological civilization is “paradoxical and a partial interpretation of China’s traditional ecological matrix; an initiative tailored by its leaders for the Chinese audience as a convenient interpretation invoking the nation’s philosophical past”. In addition, they view eco-civilization as an unlikely utopian vision of the world where production and consumption enjoy steady growth, while science and technology acts as a remedy for environmental degradation and other ecological ills. Oswald (2017) [18] insists that the “aims, goals and methods” of ecological civilization will remain “hazy” for a long time.

Although some scholars have viewed the concept of ecological civilization as ambiguous, others noted that the implementation of the policy may change the economically orientated development of the country to a more environmentally orientated and resource-conscious style of development. As China is now an influential international player in environmental policies, this change in policy orientation towards a more environmentally conscious direction can have international implications. Taking stock of extant published research on this topic covering the period since the concept was incorporated into the important political declaration may help identify the associated research that has evolved with the policy development as well as what aspects of the development have been associated with ecological civilization. These understandings may lead to a reasonable assessment of the direction of environmental policy in China and how this direction may be merged with global efforts to achieve the SDGs. In addition, by systemically comparing and contrasting research conducted within and outside China, the shared and diverge views on the concept and its implementation may be recognized. Then, areas where consensuses may be formed can be taken forward for international collaboration.

1.2. Using Bibliometric and Knowledge Mapping to Analyze Ecological Civilization

Existing analytical and review works on ecological civilization are mostly qualitative. The systemic and quantitative reviews and analyses on such a nascent topic as ecological civilization can help to clarify its origins, track the process of development, and understand contemporary views among scholars with diverse cultural and social backgrounds [19,20]. Visual mapping of the literature on ecological civilization can generate more accessible knowledge, identify research gaps, direct further scholarship, and inform the direction of policy making (e.g., [21,22,23]). Previously, bibliometric analysis was only used to analyze the literature in CNKI, the major database for Chinese academic publication, regarding how the concept of ecological civilization can be implemented in sustainable development [24]. We use bibliometric analyses and knowledge mapping to compare and contrast the quantity and themes of the publications about ecological civilization in the English and Chinese languages to identify the potential connections between ecological civilization and the SDGs. With further detailed review of the selected articles, key questions are answered, including:

(1)

Have the number and characteristics of the publications related to ecological civilization changed over time (Section 3.1.1 and Section 3.2.2)?

(2)

Has the concept been widely research outside of China (Section 3.1.3 and Section 3.1.4)?

(3)

What journals and disciplines have ecological civilization research articles been published in (Section 3.1.2)?

(4)

What are the dominant themes or theories in the research about ecological civilization (Section 3.2)?

Based on the answer obtained from the analyses, the paper then discuss the opportunities and obstacles to directing the potential global influences of implementing the ecological civilization agenda by China to facilitate sustainable development.

The rest of this work is structured as follows: the bibliometric analysis, knowledge mapping, and data collection methods conducted are detailed in Section 2. Section 3 presents the results of the bibliometric analyses, including (1) the spatiotemporal distribution and the disciplines of the publications (Section 3.1), and (2) popular research areas and frontier topics identified from keyword clusters and keyword burst analyses (Section 3.2). Section 4 discusses the results in terms of the critical attitude towards the ecological civilization agenda promoted by China (Section 4.1), and the possibility of enhancing international collaboration (Section 4.2). Finally, Section 5 summarizes and concludes the study.

2. Methods and Data

2.1. Methods

Bibliometric analysis, introduced by Pritchard (1969) [25], is a quantitative and statistical evaluation of published scientific outputs to measure the impact of publications within the scientific community [26,27,28]. The results of such systematic reviews can be made clear by knowledge mapping that may facilitate the understanding of data [29].

In this study, scholarly literature on ecological civilization was subjected to bibliometric analyses: first, the descriptive statistics of the identified articles were conducted based on the quantity of publications, subject matter, journals in which the articles are published, authorship, source countries, research institutions, and keyword frequencies [30]. The bibliometric information was then used to analyze the popular research areas and trends regarding ecological civilization. The identified research domains associated with the subject (i.e., ecological civilization) in international and Chinese studies were compared and illustrated using the knowledge mapping techniques [28].

Knowledge mapping techniques from Li, Ma and Qu (2017) and Vail (1999) [19,20] were applied to associate and visualize (in tables or graphs) the key knowledge of ecological civilization to discover the relationships between published works and to understand how ecological civilization has been studied. VOSviewer [31,32] and CiteSpace [33], the two programs that are particularly designed for the construction and visualization of bibliometric maps [34], were used for knowledge mapping in this study to identify emerging or popular concepts related to ecological civilization.

VOSviewer is a software tool for constructing and visualizing bibliometric networks such as journals, research articles, or individual publications; these networks can be constructed based on citation, bibliographic coupling, co-citation, or co-authorship relationships. Additionally, this program is equipped with text mining capabilities that may be used to create and display co-occurrence networks of significant terms taken from a corpus of scientific literature [35]. CiteSpace is an application for visualizing and analyzing trends and patterns in the scientific literature. It offers a number of features to make it easier to understand and interpret network patterns and historical patterns, such as pin-pointing topical areas with rapid growth, locating citation hotspots in the literature, breaking down networks into clusters, and automatically labeling clusters with terms from cited articles, geospatial patterns of collaboration, and special international regions [33].

In this research, VOSviewer was used to create network maps with regard to countries/regions, organizations, and authors, respectively (resultant figures presented in Section 3.1.3 and 3.2.1). CiteSpace was used to identify keywords with a high burst, defined as a significant change in the appearance of a keyword in a relatively short time period (resultant tables in Section 3.2.2). The VOSviewer software was configured as follows. “Full counting” was selected as the counting method, and the thresholds (T) of items (countries/regions, organizations, authors) were specified to fit the purpose of the analyses and are demonstrated later in this paper. The parameters of CiteSpace were set as follows: the link retaining factor was 2; look back years was set at −1; time span set at 2000–2019; years per slice at 1; and selection criteria at “Top 50”. Default settings were applied for other parameters.

2.2. Data Collection

The sources of data for bibliometric analyses included the ISI Web of Science (WoS) database (international literature) and the China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI) database (Chinese literature). The WoS database is used worldwide and provides a large resource of authoritative journals and publications on a global scale, and the CNKI database is the largest and most accessed academic online library in China. Both databases provide relevant information that can be imported into the bibliometric analysis platform. The data were subjected to bibliometric analysis and knowledge mapping (Section 2.1) to examine how theoretical and practical studies on ecological civilization have evolved in the first 20 years of the 21st century (2000 to 2019). The period covers several of the most significant governmental events in which the concept of ecological civilization was promoted and legislated, as described in Section 1.1 (17th NCCPC in 2007, 18th NCCPC in 2012, and written into the constitution in 2018). It is also argued that this is the period China in which started to reach out for international collaboration [36]. Hence, we consider how the results of the bibliometric analyses related to the ecological civilization literature in China during the period may provide insight into how ecological civilization is viewed and implemented in China under the governmental campaign; the comparison of the bibliography in China and outside China may show whether the international academic community has taken an interest in this development of an environmentally related ideology in China, which may affect the ways of China conducting international collaboration.

The international literature was obtained from the “Web of Science Core Collection” on the WoS website (http://apps.webofknowledge.com, accessed on 22 March 2020) on 22 March 2020. Using “Advanced Search”, we identified articles published between 2000 and 2019 that contained ecological civilization in the research topic (“TS (Topic Search) = ‘ecological civilization’ OR TS = ‘eco-civilization’” and “Timespan = “2000–2019””). Among the 701 search results obtained, we eliminated the publications that were not “Article”, “Review”, or “Proceedings Paper”. The title and abstract of each publication were then examined to further remove articles irrelevant to the topic. The plain text files of a final 664 publications were downloaded and saved for subsequent analyses.

On the website of CNKI (http://new.oversea.cnki.net/index/, accessed on 22 March 2020), the simplified Chinese characters “生态文明” (“ecological civilization”) were put in as the required vocabulary in the “Topic” field of the search in “Core Journals” published from 2000 to 2019. After applying the same screening strategy performed in WoS to the papers identified in the CNKI, a total of 9196 publications were obtained from 9371 search results and saved for further analyses. Figure 1a presents the search results for the international and Chinese literature, and Figure 1b illustrates the analysis process of this research.

3. Bibliometric Analysis and Knowledge Mapping Results

This section is divided into subheadings. It should provide a concise and precise description of the experimental results, their interpretation, as well as the experimental conclusions that can be drawn.

3.1. The Characteristics Analysis of Ecological Civilization Research

This section presents the development trends, disciplines, and research domains, as well as research networks of the field shown in the bibliometric analysis of the period between 2000 and 2019. The differences in the two databases are observable, implying different levels of enthusiasm and interest in researchers and target audiences on the subject of ecological civilization.

3.1.1. Chronological Trend of Publication

Chronologically, most of the publications on ecological civilization were published after 2007. The average annual number of publications in the CNKI database from 2000 to 2007 was 51, while the WoS database published only one related article in 2007. After ecological civilization was written into the Report to the 17th NCCPC [4] and became part of official discourse in China, the research on ecological civilization in China experienced two explosive growth stages and two steady development stages, according to data from the CNKI database; comparatively, the number of papers published in the WoS database showed only a modest growth (Figure 2).

It is worth noting that of the 644 articles identified in the WoS core collection, 620 publications (93.37%) were authored or co-authored by Chinese scholars. A total of 9196 publications identified in CNKI during 2000 and 2019 (Section 2.2, Figure 1) were written in the Chinese language, so presumably the authors are mostly Chinese. Both in China and internationally, ecological civilization research is dominated by Chinese scholars with limited international research interests.

Overall, the upward trends of publication in the past 20 years are observed in both databases but with distinct patterns. The numbers of CNKI publications have dominated and driven the general trend of ecological civilization studies. The clear temporal correlation between the number of publications in CNKI and NCCPCs illustrates the influence of encouraging attitudes towards ecological civilization in Chinese politics. It is possible that the ensuing lawmaking and policymaking activities incentivized research related to ecological civilization. Comparatively, from 2008 to 2019, the number of publications issued by the WoS database remained low (averaging 55 per year) and increased at a rate of 27% per year. No peaks similar to those in the CNKI database were observed.

3.1.2. The Characteristics of Journals

Table 1. Top 10 most productive journals on ecological civilization.

Rank	NP a	WoS Journal	IFW b	PP d	NP a	CNKI Journal	IFC c	PP d
1	18	. Sustainability	2.592	2.71% 407 .	407	Environmental Protection	1.914	4.43%
2	16	Chinese Journal of Urban and Environmental Studies	1.135	2.41%	338	Ecological Economy	1.732	3.68%
3	10	Journal of Cleaner Production	6.395	1.51%	323	People’s Tribune	0.484	3.51%
4	6	Ekoloji	0.053	0.90%	281	Forestry Economics	1.055	3.06%
5	5	Religions	0.448	0.75%	118	China Population, Resources and Environment	5.428	1.28%
6	5	Landscape Architecture Frontiers	0.794	0.75%	113	Teaching Reference of Middle School Politics	0.179	1.23%
7	5	International Journal of Sustainable Development and World Ecology	2.811	0.75%	94	Studies in Dialectics of Nature	0.773	1.02%
8	5	Chinese Journal of Population Resources and Environment	1.266	0.75%	84	Theory Monthly	1.057	0.91%
9	4	Journal of Coastal Research	1.503	0.60%	83	Journal of Socialist Theory Guide	1.024	0.90%
10	4	Applied Ecology and Environmental Research	0.689	0.60%	78	Qiushi	0.911	0.85%

^a NP: Number of publications in the journal in the period 2000–2019. ^b IFW: WoS journal’s impact factor according to the respective official website in 2018. ^c IFC: CNKI journal’s impact factor according to the CNKI database in 2019. ^d PP: Proportion of total publications.

illustrates the top 10 journals that published the most papers related to ecological civilization from 2000 to 2019 in the WoS and CNKI databases. In WoS, Sustainability (impact factor, IF = 3.898) published the most related papers in the study period, followed by the Chinese Journal of Urban and Environmental Studies (IF = 2.965) and the Journal of Cleaner Production (IF = 6.395). The number of publications in these three journals (44 in total) related to ecological civilization, represented 6.63% of the 664 papers retrieved. The research fields (as defined by the WoS database) covered by these top 10 journals include environmental science, sustainability and the environment, geography, planning and development, management, monitoring, policy and law, nature and landscape conservation, agricultural and biological sciences, and religious studies. Of the journals in the CNKI collection, the top three journals (Environmental Protection, Ecological Economy, and People’s Tribune) covered more than 10% of the publications during the period of this research. Based on the “discipline” defined in the database, the most productive journals with articles relating to ecological civilization are in the fields of environmental science, economy and management science, agricultural science and technology, social science, engineering science, and education. Among these journals, China Population, Resources and Environment (IF = 5.428) is a core journal in China, primarily reporting on theories and practical applications of sustainable development.

Judging from the publication spread across journals covering a variety of the fields in both the Chinese and international academic communities, ecological civilization research is considered interdisciplinary and cross disciplinary. However, it is also noted that the environmentally related aspects may have more weight among these disciplines in comparison to economic and social aspects. Among the fields covered, the absolute values of IF do not represent an equal weight of importance and quality. Therefore, in this study, we do not relate the quality of the publications to IF. A higher IF only reflects the higher visibility of that journal and, hence, the topics it reports.

3.1.3. The Characteristics of Institutions and Countries

In terms of institutions that published ecological civilization research (

Table 2. Top 10 most productive institutions studying ecological civilization.

Rank	Institution in WoS	NP a	PP b	Institution in CNKI	NP a	PP b
1	Chinese Academy of Sciences	32	4.82%	Chinese Academy of Sciences	120	1.30%
2	Hohai University	21	3.16%	Renmin University of China	106	1.15%
3	Chinese Academy of Social Sciences	16	2.41%	Chinese Academy of Social Sciences	96	1.04%
4	Tsinghua University	13	1.96%	Ministry of Environmental Protection	90	0.98%
5	Beijing Normal University	12	1.81%	Zhongnan University of Economics and Law	78	0.85%
6	China University of Geosciences (Wuhan)	9	1.36%	Sichuan University	70	0.76%
7	Wuhan University of Technology	9	1.36%	China University of Geosciences (Wuhan)	61	0.66%
8	Jinan University	8	1.20%	Peking University	59	0.64%
9	Sichuan University	7	1.05%	Wuhan University	58	0.63%
10	Beijing Forestry University	7	1.05%	Tsinghua University	50	0.54%

^a NP: Number of publications in the journals in the period 2000–2019. ^b PP: Proportion of total publications.

), in the WoS database, the 10 most productive institutions published 134 papers, accounting for 20.18% of the total publications over the 20-year period. The production rate of papers related to ecological civilization in the CNKI database is comparatively evenly spread among the journals in the collections; the top 10 institutions participated in publishing 788 papers in the past 20 years, accounting for 8.55% of the total publications. Notably, in both databases, the top 10 publishing institutions are all Chinese, indicating that research on ecological civilization is currently dominated by Chinese institutions and the contribution of international institutions is limited. Additionally, in both databases, the top 10 institutions publishing ecological civilization studies are mainly universities; the two leading research institutes in China (the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Chinese Academy of Social Sciences) occupied two of the top three places in both lists of the databases. The Ministry of Environmental Protection (known as the Ministry of Ecology and Environment since 2018) is the only governmental department appearing in the top ten institutions, and only on the CNKI list. These results have confirmed once again that the related research is conducted primarily in China, even for those studies that are published in international academic journals.

The analyses so far have indicated the research related to ecological civilization has been dominated by Chinese scholars and institutions. Among these studies, it is curious whether a level of international collaboration is involved. For this, the co-authorship network between countries indicates that in the core database of the WoS, 27 countries (regions) were engaged in ecological civilization studies between 2000 and 2019. The results of the spatial distribution of authors (Figure 3) suggested that outside of China, a few researchers based in East Asia, Europe, North America, and Oceania participated in the research on ecological civilization, while those based in Central Asia, South Asia, Africa, and South America joined much less frequently. China, the US, the Netherlands, Australia, and England were the top five countries/regions with researchers co-authoring articles published from 2000 to 2019. It seems that outside of China, some countries from Global North showed interests on the topic while those countries which shared national boundaries were not academically involved in the subject.

A co-authorship network forms 13 nodes (countries/regions) and 36 links (connection or relation between two nodes) based on the countries of contributing affiliations between 2000 and 2019 (Figure 4). In this China-centered collaboration network (Figure 4), China connected most strongly to the US, England, and Canada. Joint publications involving these three countries accounted for 56.36% (31/55) of China’s total international collaborative publications. Network links were observed between China and 12 other countries/regions. Only a small proportion of the literature on ecological civilization involved collaboration with a scholar or institution completely outside China. This pattern implies a weak global collaboration. Among the international collaborations, the existence of Chinese scholars or institutions are very much felt.

As mentioned in the introduction, environmental policy implementation in a major country such as China may affect the environmental conditions not only internally but globally. In particular, spillover effects may be felt more immediately in countries which may share cross-border environmental issues such as river management and the long-range transport of air pollutants with China [37,38,39,40,41]. However, the results in this section indicated that from the academic perspective, the countries sharing a border with China were involved. These countries are mostly developing countries and many of them may be in collaboration with China through the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) currently. They may not have sufficient capacity to conduct intensive research on deliberating the influences of the environmental agenda such as ecological civilization on their collaboration with China.

3.1.4. The Characteristics of Authors

We examined authors with frequently cited papers in the ecological civilization field. From the research direction and backgrounds of these frequent cited authors, the main emphasis of the research field can be identified. In the WoS core collection, the three most productive authors between 2000 and 2019 are not necessarily the most cited. Zhang N, a scholar at Jinan University, who ranked 4th in the number of publications, has the highest average number of citations per paper (Average Citation per Paper of One Author, ACPP = 14.33). In the WoS database, the most cited studies mainly interpreted ecological civilization using quantitative methodologies (For example, Zhang N’s co-authored paper derived modeling methods for understanding ecological benefits and trade-offs in a circular economy approach based on the concept of ecological civilization, which provided insights for the development of ecological industry in Liuzhou, China [42]. Wu J, with the second highest ACPP (9.67), co-authored a paper to assess ecological civilization [43] based on a self-constructed evaluation index system with 18 indicators related to urban resource and environment-carrying capacity).

For the Chinese publications, the number of publications and citations of an author did not necessarily correlate either. It is also noted that the prolific authors are mainly government officials and from universities, especially those from ideological and political majors. It can be inferred that publishing articles in journals collected by CNKI database can be one method that CPC officials, often also Chinese government officials and experts in ideological and political fields, use to disseminate policies. This may reflect that the high citation rate indicates that governmental political statements with reference to ecological civilization have an impact on academic research in China. The research topics of a highly cited article in CNKI are generally related to official interpretations of policy and qualitative conceptual elaborations. Cheng JH (ACPP = 35.04), whose papers in the CNKI core journals were most cited, was mainly responsible for research related to measuring the development level of China’s ecological civilization by establishing an index system [44,45]. Coming from a background in Marxist research, Wang YC (ACPP = 24.76) and Qin SS (ACPP = 19.11) are both engaged in research into ecological Marxism and ecological civilization. Their works are mostly related to the theory and system of construction of ecological civilization [46,47,48,49].

The prolific authors in Chinese and international journals present research topics in different directions; the divergence can also explain the lack of crossover between the top 10 author lists in WoS and CNKI. On the other hand, this divergence in publication topics derived from ecological civilization in Chinese and international journals can imply that journals in China and outside of China may have been aiming for audiences with different interests.

3.2. Comparative Research on Popular and Frontier Topics

To further obtain an overview related to the popular topics in relation to ecological civilization, the frequency and centrality of the keyword collection in the CNKI and WoS databases were analyzed [21,50]. This section then presents the dynamic of keyword co-appearance over time to demonstrate trends in theoretical development, and the emergence of new topics, or topics that are becoming more significant recently. A significant change in the frequency of a keyword in a relatively short time, defined as a “burst” [19], is applied as an indication of emerging topics in a field or in a journal [33]. These analyses on keywords illustrate the dynamics of research priorities, and the interests of scholars, which helps identify the emerging frontiers and developing trends within ecological civilization research. The emerging frontiers and trends may present opportunities to develop ways to concurrently facilitate achieving the SDGs at a global level and ecological civilization in China.

3.2.1. Keyword Co-Occurrence Analysis on Ecological Civilization

Table 3. The top 10 high-frequency keywords on ecological civilization from 2000 to 2019.

Rank	WoS Keywords	NO a	Centrality	CNKI Keywords	NO a	Centrality
1	ecological civilization	213	0.66	ecological civilization	3632	0.28
2	China	45	0.32	ecological civilization construction	1509	0.37
3	sustainable development	44	0.24	sustainable development	351	0.24
4	Ecological civilization construction	22	0.2	beautiful China	235	0.08
5	low-carbon economy	18	0.02	green development	220	0.04
6	green development	9	0.14	China	186	0.11
7	environmental protection	7	0.03	Xi Jinping	167	0.06
8	Sustainability	7	0.1	Marxism	153	0.07
9	ecological environment	7	0.01	human and nature	150	0.12
10	Environment	6	0.09	scientific outlook on development	143	0.06

^a NO: Number of occurrences of the keywords in the period 2000–2019.

reports the centrality of the top ten high-frequency keywords based on the total number of occurrences. Centrality is an index measuring the importance of nodes in networks, numerically normalized to the unit interval of [0, 1] [50]. A keyword with a high centrality is considered a “hub” or “critical core” of the research field. We consider a keyword with a centrality value equal to or greater than 0.1 a key study topic and, thus, a major issue of interest in ecological civilization studies [21,29].

Divergence in research directions is further demonstrated in keyword mapping and clustering. In Figure 5 and Figure 6, keywords appearing together with relatively high frequency are represented in the same color. The literature related to ecological civilization in the WoS core database was grouped into four (Figure 5). The red cluster (Cluster 1) contains terms related to the concept of ecological civilization and ecology (i.e., “sustainability”, “ecological footprint”, and “ecosystem services”). China is the core keyword in this cluster, which reflects that the main keywords of ecological civilization are closely related to the context of China. The green cluster (Cluster 2), with the core keyword “ecological civilization”, is strongly related to “sustainable development”, “ecological ethics”, “low-carbon economy”, and “evaluation” (of ecological civilization). The blue cluster (Cluster 3) is mainly the field of “ecological civilization construction” and contains initiatives and measures for constructing an ecological civilization. The yellow cluster (Cluster 4) is the field of “new urbanization”, “ecological environment”, and “ecological economy”. Though there is no one prominent core keyword in this cluster, the three equally weighted keywords demonstrate that ecological civilization involves many fields, including not only the field of ecology and environment, but also economy and urbanization.

Figure 6 shows four core clusters of research in the CNKI core database: The red cluster (Cluster 1) mainly contains “ecological civilization” itself and closely related concepts, such as “sustainable-development” (可持续发展), “industrial civilization” (工业文明), “low-carbon economy” (低碳经济), and “circular economy” (循环经济). The green cluster (Cluster 2), with the core keyword “ecological civilization construction”, contains some aspects that contribute to an ecological civilization. For instance, “scientific outlook on development” (科学发展观) was the slogan embodying the concept of green development in China before ecological civilization; harmony between “human and nature” (人与自然) is one of the philosophical meanings of ecological civilization; and “innovation” (创新) is a pre-requisite for using technology to deliver an ecological civilization. The main keywords in the blue cluster (Cluster 3) cover “socialism with Chinese characteristics” (中国特色社会主义) and “Xi Jinping” (习近平). The unique appearance of these types of keywords in the network based on the CNKI database indicates that some studies targeting Chinese audiences try to make sense of the links between ecological civilization, Chinese leaders, and China’s social system. The yellow cluster (Cluster 4) covers educational, ideological, and philosophical issues. The keyword “Marxism” (马克思主义) is the most frequent in this cluster, and other keywords mainly include “viewpoint about ecological civilization”(生态文明观), “ecological civilization education” (生态文明教育), and “ecological ethics” (生态伦理).

The terms constituting Cluster 3 in Chinese journals (Figure 6) indicate that the understanding of political discourse and the analysis of leaders’ thoughts have become an important branch of the study of ecological civilization in China, especially when the target audiences are Chinese people or scholars. Considering that the main participants in the study of ecological civilization are for the moment Chinese scholars, it is implied that there is a specialized branch of research in ecological civilization inside China that is connected strongly with, and influenced by, the propaganda of the Chinese government or the CPC. This view is shared by Goron (2018) who argues that ecological civilization demonstrates that Chinese scientific concepts and theories need to support the propaganda of the CPC [15]. However, audiences outside China may not be as interested in this branch of research. This might explain the divergence in research context observed in the WoS and CNKI databases, despite the authors’ demographic similarity. Although the divergent is obvious, the connection between “ecological civilization” and “sustainable development” is still noticeable between the two analyses of co-occurrence, consistent with the statistical results on keyword frequency (

Table 4. Top 10 keywords with the strongest bursts on ecological civilization (WoS).

Keywords	Strength	Begin	End	2000        2012     2019
low-carbon economy	4.3258	2010	2011	▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▃▃▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂
sustainable development	3.2466	2010	2013	▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▃▃▃▃▂▂▂▂▂▂
climate change	2.3288	2015	2016	▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▃▃▂▂▂
new era	2.2846	2016	2016	▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▃▂▂▂
green development	2.1651	2017	2019	▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▃▃▃
ecological ethics	2.1265	2017	2017	▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▃▂▂
public participation	2.0097	2009	2013	▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▃▃▃▃▃▂▂▂▂▂▂
index system	1.9929	2012	2015	▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▃▃▃▃▂▂▂▂
counter measure	1.8327	2014	2014	▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▃▂▂▂▂▂
beautiful China	1.6248	2017	2019	▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▃▃▃

Note: In the column “2000–2012–2019”, the red and blue short lines constitute the time span covered by this study and the red short lines represent the burst stage during the life cycle of the keywords on ecological civilization studies in WoS database.

).

3.2.2. Keywords Bursts on Ecological Civilization

Table 4 illustrates the top 10 keywords producing the strongest bursts in the WOS database during the given periods covered by this study. It is considered that the most prominent keyword bursts in ecological civilization occur between 2000 and 2019 in papers related to three issues: background of ecological civilization (keywords: “climate change” and “new era”); practice of ecological civilization (keywords: “public participation”, “index system” and “counter measure”); and the goal and task of ecological civilization (keywords: “low-carbon economy”, “sustainable development”, “green development”, and “beautiful China”). Among these keywords, the frequencies of “green development” and “beautiful China” increased and were sustained during the period leading up to 2019, while the keywords “new era”, “ecological ethics”, and “counter measure” had shorter bursts of frequency before 2019, which were not persistent. The three main issues discussed in international journal articles suggest that the current interests in ecological civilization within international communities are the introduction and interpretation of this concept and how it has been constructed by China. The turnover in popular keywords shows that during the time period we analyzed, the theoretical framework and developing strategies of ecological civilization were still being shaped.

Table 5. Top 10 keywords with the strongest bursts on ecological civilization (CNKI).

Keywords	Strength	Begin	End	2000        2012       2019
green development	63.8320	2016	2019	▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▃▃▃▃
Xi Jinping	51.1657	2016	2019	▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▃▃▃▃
scientific outlook on development	38.6689	2004	2012	▂▂▂▂▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▂▂▂▂▂▂▂
new era	31.5451	2018	2019	▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▃▃
organic Marxism	23.1475	2016	2017	▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▃▃▂▂
low-carbon economy	22.3153	2010	2011	▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▃▃▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂
ecological civilization thought	21.6431	2018	2019	▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▃▃
new type of urbanization	18.2378	2014	2016	▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▃▃▃▂▂▂
harmonious society	17.4029	2006	2012	▂▂▂▂▂▂▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▂▂▂▂▂▂▂
rural revitalization	17.0739	2018	2019	▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▂▃▃

Note: In the column “2000–2012–2019”, the red and blue short lines constitute the time span of this study and the red short lines represent the life cycle of the burst keywords on ecological civilization in the CNKI database.

shows the top 10 keywords with the strongest bursts in the CNKI database. These keywords can be divided into two categories by time; namely, “scientific outlook on development”, “low-carbon economy”, and “harmonious society” before the year of 2012; and seven other keywords after the year of 2012. This result corresponds to two political periods in China: the “Hu era” before 2012 and the “Xi era” after 2012. The “Hu era” brought ecological civilization into political discourse, combining it with the concepts of “scientific outlook on development” and “harmonious society” which were prevalent at that time. Research on ecological civilization and economic development emerged after the “Xi era” began, and keywords such as “low-carbon economy” appeared with a high frequency and high burst strength before 2012. Interestingly, by contrast with this distinct time division, the bursts of keywords in WoS (Table 4) such as “sustainable development” and “public participation” have survived the transition of the political eras.

Since 2012, the study of ecological civilization has had observable political characteristics and temporal patterns in China; studies combining ecological civilization and Marxist theory have been increasing. Many studies on Xi Jinping’s thoughts on ecological civilization have emerged. As such, the studies of ecological civilization found in the CNKI database are, to some extent, in response to political statements advocated by the CPC. For instance, popular words in the political domain such as “Xi Jinping” and, recently, “new era” have a strong burst strength in studies on ecological civilization in the consecutive years leading up to 2019. This phenomenon can be interpreted as the attempts of Chinese scholars to contribute to making the concept of ecological civilization more accessible by closely linking ecological civilization with China’s political context and official statements to influence policy-making and implementation [36]. In addition, the emergence of high strength bursts of keywords including “new type of urbanization” from 2014 to 2016 and “rural revitalization” from 2018 to 2019 showed a consistency with the development emphases shifting from urban to rural in order to balance the urban–rural disparity in China and aim for “common prosperity”; this goal has been heavily promoted and pushed during Xi’s ruling period. This also indicates that the research on ecological civilization in China has started merging with other national development policies, thereby shifting the focus from theory to practice.

Developing implementable frameworks to realize the abstract and philosophical ideas of ecological civilization in projects is worth further exploration. A notable example is “green development”, ranked first in the CNKI database with the strongest bursts, and fifth in the WoS database (2017–2019 in WoS database, and 2016–2019 in CNKI database), but with both appearing towards the end of the period of analyses. Similar to the “low carbon economy” that was popular from 2010 to 2012, as a part of global sustainable development practice, green development has become a topic central to ecological civilization research, appealing to both international and Chinese audiences. Green development was a concept strongly associated with the environmentally friendly development of real estate in 1990s [51,52] and practiced in developed countries such as the United States [53]. The concept and practice has been expanded to the development of a variety of areas to balance the resource exploration, environmental quality, and economic development. Thus, the low-carbon economy can be part of green development [54].

4. Discussion

Using bibliometric analyses, we answered the four questions set at the beginning of this article (Section 1.2). We have demonstrated that academic publication inside China has been strongly influenced by important political events in China (Figure 2). This influence is not as obvious for publication outside China. In fact, the concept of ecological civilization is not enthusiastically researched outside China (answer to question 1); international publications on ecological civilization are still dominated by Chinese institutes and authors (answer to questions 2). On the other hand, we find that the research related to ecological civilization is usually multidisciplinary (answer to question 3). It may be more relevant to the environment than socio-economic aspects. Ecological civilization, in both Chinese literature and international literature, is strongly connected to sustainable development (answer to question 4). However, a unique branch for the understanding of political discourse and the analysis of leaders’ thoughts was identified in the Chinese publications.

Based on the answers to the questions, in this final discussion, we considered how implementing ecological civilization, as it were studied, may affect sustainable development globally. We suggest that ecological civilization agenda promoted in China, if properly applied to the project of collaboration between China and other countries, may directly facilitate achieving SDGs that may be more relevant to environmental sustainability.

4.1. Potential Impacts of China’s Ecological Civilization on International Collaboration

In the research, the quantitative approach to comparative studies may help identify similarities and differences between the highlighted topics and concepts with efficiency and, thus, point in a potential direction for international collaboration. The systemic comparisons indicate the divergent directions of the studies on ecological civilization. In China, ecological civilization has been closely associated with the country’s contemporary political agenda, under which the interpretation of the concept may be more to direct the implementation of environmentally related policies which may be related to realizing sustainable development. However, the work published internationally, though also mostly completed by Chinese scholars, emphasizes heavily the connections between ecological civilization and sustainable development. A further selective review of literature showed that work completed by the Western scholars may either be in the stage of defining the term under the Chinese contexts (e.g., [15,55]), associating the term with sustainable development (e.g., [55,56,57]), or commenting on how China uses the concept in policy making (e.g., [43,58]).

The concept of ecological civilization heavily influences environmental policymaking in China, whose implementation in local laws and policies may impact global environment. One of the well-known topics that is connected to ecological civilization may be the low-carbon economy in China (e.g., [17,56,59,60,61]). In our analyses, the low-carbon economy had a strong appearance in both the co-appearance networks (Figure 5 and Figure 6) and the keyword burst analyses (Table 4 and Table 5) during the earlier period. China’s commitment to becoming a carbon neutral country by 2060 and the recent declaration of peaking carbon use by 2030 may reflect the commitment to the implementation of the low-carbon economy. This commitment may contribute significantly to achieving SDG 13 within the country and in the wider regions [62].

In addition, the results have shown that the scholars studying this topic are mostly Chinese; the Chinese socio-cultural context formed a more significant part of our data analyses. In future research, this may be made up by in-depth qualitative literature analyses on ecological civilization to further understand the theoretical bases and points of debates from the variety of standpoints of the international stakeholders. While the field has recently been dominated by Chinese scholars, the strong association made between ecological civilization and sustainable development (Figure 5 and Figure 6) provides opportunities for the international communities to contextualize ecological civilization which aids the extension of research elsewhere from the standpoint of achieving the SDGs, a shared interest internationally. Possibilities for international collaboration include the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) [55,63,64], the environmental projects promoted by UNEP [16,65], as well as some international non-governmental organization or civil societies [61].

However, the limited number of studies we identified on ecological civilization by scholars outside China indicates that international scholars are less interested in the topic as a focus of academic research. The noticeable political association of ecological civilization in China probably renders scholars outside of China uninterested or unaware of the topic, unless their area of study is about politics in China. The result of this may also be the that the potential change in attitude in China and in the Chinese government towards a more environmentally friendly direction has not been positively recognized and portrayed in international media [66]. Indeed, articles expressing critical perspectives on ecological civilization are nearly entirely from non-Chinese authors casting skeptical eyes on both the intention of such a political declaration as well as whether the related policy may work.

For instance, Russian scholars Tracy et al. (2017) note that China’s domestic ecological civilization and green shift policies may be partly achieved by migrating polluting industries abroad and consuming foreign natural resources [64]. China’s implementation of the “Belt and Road” Initiative (BRI) might create new environmental risks rather than promoting ecological civilization beyond its national boundaries. They urged countries collaborating with China under the BRI to uphold the same level of environmental standards to avoid the externalization of environmental costs by China. In the analyses of geographic distribution of the ecological civilization research (Figure 3), we noticed that the countries in the areas where China promotes BRI, very few studies were published. Thus, it is unclear how scholars or practitioners in these countries perceive the statement of ecological civilization and how the concept can be implemented in the BRI. Hubbert (2015) argues that ecological civilization merely rehashes the discourses of green capitalism and ecological modernization from the developed world, rather than providing alternative practical solutions for developing countries [67]. Arguably, ecological civilization represents a kind of “cultural chauvinism” which is incompatible with the need for collaborative activities for confronting global environmental threats [68].

In addition, in Chinese cultural contexts, the word “civilization” contains a sense of moral superiority over “development” as in sustainable development, while the political setting gives the authority to the Chinese government to determine “what is ‘quality’ or ‘civilization’, and, thus, the direction of transitions that directly involve its citizenry [69] (p. 3).” Based on this line of thought, the realization of ecological civilization inside China is considered a top-down process rather than a collaborative or participatory process; the interpretation of these terms may be changed to suit the ideology of the political leaders. This pattern was indeed shown in the keyword burst analyses for the research in China (Table 5): a distinct division of keyword bursts between the two leadership periods (Hu and Xi’s tenure) indicates the changing approaches and contents of the related research.

The general view expressed in the scholarly research outside the China infers that international collaboration in ecological civilization practice would only be desirable provided the goals of such a collaboration can mutually benefit the sustainable development of the participating countries. Outside academia, in our wider reading in publications or documents from international organizations or non-governmental organizations, a relatively optimistic attitude can be identified towards collaboration in the work on ecological civilization to push for green development or a green economy (e.g., [16,55,61]). It seems, at the level of implementing sustainable development work with China, that those organizations have been attempting to build some mutual ground for collaboration with China based on the understanding of ecological civilization under the Chinese context to achieve sustainability. This demonstrates a way to strengthen the means of implementation and revitalize the global partnership for sustainable development (SDG 17). On this common ground, scholars around the world have much to contribute either via offering critiques or recommending pragmatic approaches to the positive development of ecological civilization. This collaboration may facilitate China’s participation in global environmental governance and South–South cooperation. We believe a level of skepticism from the academic research community is meaningful to inform the potential risk to the enthusiastic practitioner of international collaborations in socio-, economic, or environmental development under the consideration of ecological civilization. To seek mutual ground for collaboration that creates a win–win situation internationally, however, requires a collaboration in research between scholars in China and outside of China, to further theorize how the concept can be implemented in a way which fulfills the needs of sustainable development at a global level that may benefit all involved. As revealed by our analyses, such collaboration has not been very frequent.

4.2. Relate Ecological Civilization with Sustainable Development

Our identified popular research topics (co-occurrence of the keywords) and frontier analysis (burst of the keywords) showed evidently that scholars connect the ecological civilization strongly with sustainable development. However, it is unclear whether it is completely being used as a Chinese interpretation of sustainable development (i.e., supporting sustainable development) or as an alternative concept within the Chinese context.

Sustainable development was introduced in the 1987 Brundtland Report and was famously defined as “development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs [70] (p. 40).” Such development should be achieved by seeking economic development, social justice, and environmental protection simultaneously [71]. In 2015, 17 Sustainable Development Goals to end poverty, combat inequality and injustice, and tackle climate change by 2030 were agreed by world leaders [65].

The Chinese government, as early as 1995, proposed pursuing sustainable development. Then, since 2012, China has highlighted ecological civilization as a long-term national strategy to promote sustainable development [72]. Between 2012 and present, the relationship between ecological civilization and sustainable development has been depicted and analyzed from several angles. Some scholars argue that the concept of ecological civilization Sinicizes the concept of sustainable development by emphasizing the importance of environmental protection, with the coordination and integration of the economic, social, and environmental aspects, despite differences in the theoretical origins of the two concepts [73,74]. In Chinese discourse, reference to sustainable development has gradually given way to the promotion of an ecological civilization [56]. Some scholars worry that the politicization of ecological civilization as a uniquely Chinese concept might render critical academic study difficult and politically constrain the interpretation that ecological civilization and sustainable development have a shared aspiration in human development [15,75].

Additional pieces of evidence of China taking actions to pursue global sustainable development through ecological civilization are that, in recent years, China has been integrating the construct of ecological civilization with global environmental governance and green development through international collaboration. In terms of the BRI, China has worked with the international community and established the BRI International Green Development Coalition in 2019 to implement the UN 2030 SDGs. To date, some 150 Chinese and international partners from over 40 countries have joined the coalition to deepen collaboration in green technology and green finance [76]. The abovementioned practices may be a good facilitator to achieve the SDGs in a way that is relevant to cross-boundary environmental quality and use of economic resources.

In addition, China has attempted to fulfil its international obligations and responsibilities for environmental protection and sustainable development, including carbon emission reduction [77], ozone layer protection [78,79], promoting South–South environmental collaboration [80], promoting environmental protection in developing countries through investment or donation [80], strengthening the environmental impact assessment of overseas projects [81], and promoting international exchanges and cooperation on climate change [16,82]. As declared in a position paper at the United Nations Biodiversity Conference [83], one of the important documents developed during the preparation of fifteenth meeting of the Conference of Parties (COP 15), by adhering to ecological civilization, China considers itself committed to green development and is willing to work with the international community for such development. The position may be an extension of the statement that China has confirmed to its national audience by releasing news from China’s official media announcing, “the construction of ecological civilization helps to form a solution for world environmental protection and sustainable development [84]”.

Ecological civilization has now been treated as a development paradigm by China within the nation and when seeking international collaboration. Our analyses showed that the research conducted by the Chinese scholars mostly aims for the development of better practices based on the paradigm and under the political agenda within the nation, while still connecting the concept with sustainable development. Since ecological civilization is firmly embedded in Chinese environmental and development policies, the implementation of it may influence global efforts in pursuing sustainable development. At the level of research and practice, building mutual understanding and an acceptable definition of ecological civilization is needed together by China and international communities to develop pragmatic approaches to achieving the shared goal of sustainable development.

From a pragmatic standpoint, the concept of ecological civilization is currently strongly associated with green development in the related research within and outside China (Table 4 and Table 5). Green development has been practiced more successfully in developed countries [85] and technology gaps exist between countries with different levels of economic power [86]. The uneven performances of green development may require international collaboration on financial aid or technology transfer. Facilitating and supporting green development in countries that have lagged behind can be a common ground for international collaboration. For China, this can be part of the implementation of the ecological civilization, while for the globe, it can be part of the effort to achieve sustainable development. Such a collaboration not only requires joint efforts across nations and regions, but also between governments, non-governmental organizations, and academia.

5. Summary and Conclusions

This paper used bibliometric analysis and knowledge mapping to analyze popular research topics and trends related to ecological civilization. Based on the results, the differences and connections between international and Chinese academic studies were evaluated.

Our bibliometric analyses have comprehensively answered the four questions we posed earlier in this article:

First, we found that the number of publications related to ecological civilization increased over time (Figure 2, Section 3.1.2 and Section 3.2.2). Inside China in particular, the publication number peaked with two important political events: the 17th and 18th NCCPCs in 2007 and 2012, respectively. The publications in the international journal database only increased gradually over time, with no obvious peaks. The keyword burst analyses then revealed that over the two decades, the emphases of research of ecological civilization have shifted. Inside China, this shift appears to be quite distinctly associated with the leadership change in 2012, while outside China, the change was gradual.

Second, we found that the concept has not been widely researched outside of China (Section 3.1.3 and Section 3.1.4). The study of ecological civilization was greatly promoted inside China and, to lesser extent, outside the country. Among international publications (WoS), after China, the concept is most studied and published about in developed countries (such as the US, England, Australia, and some European countries) rather than those countries neighboring China, or developing countries who may be affected by the environmental policies more directly through cross-border issues or the BRI.

Third, the research on ecological civilization covers a variety of research disciplines. However, the environmentally related aspects may have more weight than economic and social aspects (Section 3.1.2).

Fourth, in the keyword analyses, we identified that ecological civilization, in both Chinese and international publications, has been highly associated with the concept of sustainable development. Recently, the discussion has further focused on green development (Section 3.2).

By integrating our further reading of the literature and the answers from the four questions, we can conclude that studies of ecological civilization are mainly published by Chinese scholars affiliated with Chinese institutions. The research inside China may be quite politically driven; the focus may change with the leadership, though still under the umbrella of the concept. The highly political use of ecological civilization may invite skepticism from international scholars. On the other hand, as a major country of both consumption and production in the globe, China’s pursuit of a green transition under the agenda of ecological civilization can become a lever to facilitate global sustainable development.

The study contributes to the research related to ecological civilization by revealing the gap in international collaboration on ecological civilization in academia, although with China’s official advocacy, ecological civilization seems to have been accepted by some international organizations and governments. Based on this, collaborations have recently been carried out to implement sustainable development from the aspect of a low-carbon economy and green development.

Systemically mapping research on the concept of ecological civilization has given us a wider perspective on how China may apply this concept to achieve sustainable development. This study is first to identify shared key concepts and research topics such as the low-carbon economy and green development, which are compatible with international mainstream theories and practices of sustainable development that specifically address balancing environmental preservation and economic resources.

This research has developed an initial map and broad characterization of the literature around ecological civilization in China and internationally, using bibliometric analyses. However, this approach heavily relies on keywords in the literature. The interpretation based on these identified keywords may be helpful in detecting the trend of research, but the specific and potentially diversified viewpoints of these studies may be masked. We have discussed the contents of a few selected papers we believe to be representative; still, a more rigorous and systemic study of the contents of the literature on ecological civilization may be needed to improve and complete the preliminary conclusion of the present study. From the temporal aspect, our bibliometric analyses cover the period before the COVID-19 pandemic. Further research can certainly be conducted to see whether the outbreak and the gradual changes in the geopolitical situation since, have affected the study of ecological civilization in China and internationally, and how collaboration in sustainable development between nations might take place under the trend of deglobalization. International collaboration in the area of environmental sustainability may be among the selected few aspects that should be continued around the globe, as nature has no boundary.