Organisational capability trajectories in contemporary resource-based view (RBV) scholarship: a field-level bibliometric, structural and thematic synthesis (2021–2025)

The contemporary evolution of the resource-based view (RBV) builds on a foundational lineage that spans firm growth logic (Penrose, 1959), resource position barriers (Wernerfelt, 1984), strategic factor markets (Barney, 1986), strategic asset accumulation (Dierickx and Cool, 1989), sustained competitive advantage criteria (Barney, 1991), firm heterogeneity (Mahoney and Pandian, 1992), chronological timeline for competitive advantage (Peteraf, 1993), natural resource-based view (Hart, 1995), knowledge-based view (Grant, 1996) and dynamic capabilities (Teece et al., 1997).

While the RBV continues to anchor strategic management, unresolved questions remain regarding its theoretical coherence, boundary conditions, thematic evolution and intellectual structure. Rapid developments in technology, governance, internationalisation, strategic alliances and artificial intelligence, as well as the systemic shocks of the COVID-19 pandemic (2021–2025), directly compound these boundary uncertainties. The post-pandemic period has introduced new pressures on RBV’s theoretical framework and reconfigured resource categories, challenging RBV’s assumptions about resource stickiness and prompting scholars to rethink what constitutes strategic value. For example, in volatile environments, ESG attributes (Bhandari et al., 2022), supply chain flexibility (Agrawal et al., 2023), digital capabilities (Chaudhuri et al., 2022) and organisational resilience (Pratono, 2022) are increasingly recognised as drivers of competitive advantage. Consequently, the RBV framework must adapt and evolve in tandem with technological and institutional shifts to remain relevant (Beamish and Chakravarty, 2021; Khanra et al., 2022).

Amid this background, the present study is guided by the following research question:

To address this question, our bibliometric synthesis of RBV literature published in the Web of Science Core Collection during 2021–2025 combines a structural lens (citation networks, co-authorship patterns and cluster mappings) with a thematic lens (conceptual categories, evolving constructs and domain applications). From an operationalisation standpoint, overlay visualisations capture recency via average publication year per keyword, whereas density visualisations capture conceptual prominence via keyword frequency and total link strength (TLS). The quantitative analytical approach in the study moves the discussion on RBV scholarship beyond descriptive mappings, allowing the dual-lens design to provide an analysis closely tied to theoretical development that captures RBV’s intellectual trajectory, identifies its reconfigured resource categories and assesses its relevance in light of the contemporary strategic pressures outlined earlier.

A comprehensive scan of RBV literature in the Web of Science Core Collection (1984–2025) generated 72 search results, of which 32 bibliometric studies and reviews were identified as relevant (Table 1). These reveal five limitations. Firstly, many studies mention RBV as a guiding framework in domain areas such as HR training (Danvila-del-Valle et al., 2019), talent management (Gallardo-Gallardo et al., 2015), green innovation (Khanra et al., 2022) and corporate entrepreneurship (Glinyanova et al., 2021) but remain descriptive in nature and do not engage with its theoretical structure. Secondly, bibliometric mappings present clusters and citation analyses, but fail to integrate visual, structural and conceptual dimensions into their interpretations (Ferreira et al., 2016; Zhang et al., 2021). Thirdly, even when the RBV framework is substantively applied, such as in energy and sustainability (Razi et al., 2024; Rodrigues and Franco, 2019), business model and portfolio restructuring (Sánchez-Riofrío et al., 2015; Zhao and Pan, 2022), innovation and entrepreneurship (Karray et al., 2025; Lopes et al., 2021), data analytics (Novicka and Volkova, 2025) and international business (Bui et al., 2025; White et al., 2016), its integration is diluted by competing frameworks or left underexamined in terms of evolving structural logic. Fourthly, reviews remain siloed, presenting maps and charts without connecting them to thematic clusters or citation patterns (Bagherian et al., 2024; Hao et al., 2022). Fifthly, and perhaps most critically, no recent study has traced RBV’s evolution in the 2021–2025 period, despite its exceptional trajectory of articles and citations.

While the foundational 1984–2005 period continues to hold the highest cumulative citation share due to its longevity, the 2021–2025 period stands out for its exceptional citation velocity. Despite being the most recent and having the shortest citation window, the total number of articles published was 4,232, accounting for 49.23% of all articles published from 1984 to 2025; furthermore, these 4,232 articles have received 81,533 citations, accounting for 15.73% of all RBV citations to date (Table 2). Strikingly, the contemporary five-year cohort (2021–2025) has already surpassed the absolute citation totals and percentage shares of both the 2006–2010 (15.44%) and 2011–2015 (15.64%) blocks, despite those earlier periods possessing up to two decades of additional accumulation time. The forward-weighted momentum signals immediate scholarly uptake and thematic resonance, suggesting that recent RBV contributions are not only prolific but also rapidly absorbed and actively shaping theoretical debates.

Two critical insights emerge from the analysis:

1. Prior bibliometric studies have emphasised descriptive metrics over explaining how the underlying theory is actively being shaped at the field level.

2. The 2021–2025 article and citation momentum present a distinct opportunity for a dual-lens bibliometric analysis that diagnoses the current state and projects the future evolution of the field.

The data set for this study was drawn from the Web of Science Core Collection, a database widely recognised for its comprehensive indexing standards and reliability in bibliometric science mapping (Huertas González-Serrano et al., 2020; Li et al., 2018; Matthews, 2025). Before executing the primary query, an iterative pre-search pilot study was conducted to validate the search string using phrases and terms used in research-based view literature. The finalised search query combined the terms “resource-based view” and “resource-based theory” across titles, abstracts and author keywords and was cross-checked with related variants such as “RBV” and “VRIN”, which showed near-complete overlap, confirming the sufficiency of the chosen string.

The search was conducted on 1 July, 2026, and, to ensure reporting transparency and replicability, the sample selection process adhered to the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines (Page et al., 2021). The PRISMA guideline-based protocol flow diagram is shown in Figure 1. This initial identification query yielded a total of 10,698 records. Subsequently, filters were sequentially applied:

• A temporal restriction was imposed to search for the five years of interest spanning 2021–2025.

• A document-type filter restricted the sample exclusively to peer-reviewed journal and review articles to omit non-refereed conference proceedings, book chapters and editorial material to ensure methodological rigour and comparability across citation metrics (Block and Fisch, 2020; Mukherjee et al., 2022).

• A language filter isolated English-only publications, resulting in a baseline dataset of 4,232 documents.

For the 2021–2025 period, the baseline data set collectively received 81,533 citations, averaging 19.27 citations per article, with an H-index of 112.

To ensure maximum data set integrity prior to network visualisation, a multi-stage quality-control protocol was implemented for the baseline data set comprising 4,232 documents. The first phase involved a comprehensive duplication analysis of the entire sample of 4,232 documents, using conditional formatting in Microsoft Excel to remove duplicates, with digital object identifier (DOI) as the field criterion. The results flagged 41 documents that lacked DOIs, a typical occurrence during raw data exports. All 41 documents were manually analysed and cross-matched with other unique identifiers, such as title-author names and found to be valid, resulting in a zero-duplicate baseline. The clean sample of 4,232 documents then underwent a rigorous, parallel, dual-stage manual quality audit. Two subsets of articles were created: one comprising 10% of the most-cited documents in the sample (n = 423), and another comprising 10% of randomly selected documents from the sample (n = 423). Every document in both subsets was independently evaluated by the authors for relevance to the RBV, and all 846 articles across the subsets were deemed valid, resulting in a final corpus of 4,232 unique articles for the network software visualisation analysis.

To examine how recency and citation impact shape the trajectory of RBV scholarship, this study leverages a bibliometric co-occurrence technique with a focus on semantic mapping. Bibliometric methods are recommended as rigorous tools for science mapping in business research (Donthu et al., 2021) and have been shown to enhance rigour in management and organisation studies (Zupic and Čater, 2015). The data set comprises 4,232 documents from 2021 to 2025, extracted in accordance with the PRISMA protocol outlined earlier in the methodology section (Figure 1). By assessing how frequently specific author keywords co-occur within this corpus, this analysis uncovers the emergent and evolving vocabularies that are redefining RBV – reflecting both the introduction of new constructs and the re-articulation of established RBV themes. Unlike citation-based approaches that privilege historical influence, co-occurrence analysis captures the field’s real-time discourse, enabling observation of how RBV constructs are actively reframed in response to contemporary challenges.

The central research question is operationalised directly through the combined deployment of overlay and density visualisations computed from the underlying keyword co-occurrence matrix. These two visualisations evaluate the network through distinct yet complementary dimensions:

1. The overlay lens: This dimension captures temporal recency by calculating and mapping the average publication year associated with each keyword node, exposing which capability constructs are gaining immediate traction in current literature.

2. The density lens: This dimension captures the frequency and concentration of conceptual co-occurrences. It scales each node based on how often a keyword appears and how tightly packed it is within a cluster of related terms, visually separating the heavily crowded “core” domains of the literature from more sparse, peripheral research areas.

Together, these analytical dimensions provide an integrated, dual-lens, temporal–impact view of RBV’s shifting boundaries. This integrated mapping structure closely adheres to recent advanced interpretive guidelines, which emphasise that, to prevent descriptive superficiality, scholars must contextualise and synthesise overlay and density outputs in combination rather than treating them as isolated maps (Lim et al., 2024; Mukherjee et al., 2022). To mathematically construct and visualise these multi-layered semantic networks, VOSviewer software was used (Van Eck and Waltman, 2018).

Author keywords serve as intentional proxies for a field’s real-time conceptual boundaries and thematic evolution (Donthu et al., 2021; Zupic and Čater, 2015). To generate the overlay and density maps from the 4,232 documents, the full counting method was used (Perianes-Rodriguez et al., 2016). The full counting approach prevents the artificial deflation of connection strengths in descriptive papers with more keywords and directly maps the absolute, real-world frequency of interactions in contemporary RBV scholarship.

The authors followed established guidance in preparing the database for bibliometric analysis (Lim et al., 2024; Marzi et al., 2025). Firstly, words that referred to the same concept or idea or used different spellings, abbreviations or phrasing were merged with a common terminology accepted and used in the field. For example, “RBV”, “resource-based view (RBV)” and “resource based view” were combined under the single term “resource-based view”. Likewise, variants such as “small and medium enterprises” and “small- and medium-sized enterprises” were merged into “SMEs,” and closely related descriptors like “emerging economies” were standardised as “emerging markets”. In this way, the authors addressed the common practice of authors labelling concepts and terms differently and ensured that the maps did not split into multiple nodes of the same concept. Secondly, keywords that did not represent theoretical concepts or were unrelated to the RBV and had the potential to form clusters on the map driven by methodological, locational and other non-substantive factors were omitted from the analysis. These included research methods (“PLS-SEM”, “systematic literature review”, “meta-analysis”, “bibliometric analysis” and “case study”) and country names. A list of major author keywords identified and uploaded to VOSviewer is provided in the author keyword co-occurrence thesaurus criteria (Table 3).

A minimum co-occurrence threshold of 15 was used to generate the final maps, which contained 133 unique author keywords that appeared frequently enough to represent the field’s core conceptual vocabulary (Lim et al., 2024). The keywords collectively formed 2,315 links with an aggregate TLS of 5,840. The threshold improved the map’s interpretability and reduced the risk of keyword creeping from rare or idiosyncratic terms. The seven thematic clusters were generated automatically by VOSviewer’s internal algorithm, with strategic calibration of the resolution parameters, using keywords based on their actual patterns of co-occurrence rather than on any subjective judgement by the authors. The metrics for the nodes within each cluster are consolidated in Table 4 of the citation and temporal matrix of author keyword co-occurrences. The overlay and density visualisations are provided in Figures 2 and 3, respectively, and were generated using the standard resolution settings in VOSviewer. The maps reflect distinct, data-driven themes and clusters that are analysed in the results section.

The overlay and density visualisations (Figures 2 and 3) build on the same co-occurrence network of 133 keywords but introduce distinct analytical lenses to map the intellectual frontiers of contemporary RBV scholarship. The overlay map captures recency by shading each keyword according to the average publication year of the articles in which it appears, highlighting which organisational capability constructs are gaining immediate traction. In contrast, the density map reflects keyword frequency and TLS, consistent with VOSviewer’s default density algorithm. Bright yellow regions indicate keywords that appear most frequently and have the strongest co-occurrence connections, and cooler green/blue regions represent keywords that appear less frequently or have weaker network connectivity, even if they have high citation averages. Citation influence is separately assessed through the average citation counts (C_avg) reported in Table 4. Together, the maps in Figures 2 and 3 and Table 4 metrics data reveal how RBV constructs vary in temporal relevance, conceptual prominence and scholarly impact, enabling a deeper interpretation of the field’s contemporary evolution.

The analysis of the seven clusters leverages the overlay and density maps (Figures 2 and 3) and the metrics generated in VOSviewer, as provided in Table 4, such as the average publication year (Y_avg), average citations (C_avg), TLS and frequency of occurrences (f). Keywords with a Y avg below 2023.60 represent the established, foundational bedrock of the vocabulary (such as resource-based view and competitive advantage). Terms spanning 2023.60–2023.90 capture a clear transition phase in which core theoretical ideas are being applied to a broader range of real-world settings, specifically small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and emerging-market contexts. Meanwhile, nodes exceeding 2023.90 capture the newest, fastest-growing research areas in which scholars are expanding the traditional RBV boundaries to accommodate digital assets (such as artificial intelligence and digital transformation) and ecological assets (such as green innovation and the circular economy). Similarly, the underlying citation matrix distinguishes high-impact citation anchors (C_avg of 25.0 or higher) from emergent, lower-impact footprints (C_avg below 25.0), which represent nascent frontiers that are actively discussed but have not yet had the time to accumulate large citation totals.

Overlay analysis: In this cluster, traditional terms such as performance (Y_avg = 2023.55) appear mostly in older papers, representing the field’s established foundation, shown in cool blues and greens. In contrast, newer topics like sustainability (Y_avg = 2023.82), circular economy (Y_avg = 2023.94) and artificial intelligence (Y_avg = 2024.38) have emerged recently, shifting the map into warm yellows. This timeline shows that RBV scholars are increasingly looking at how digital technologies intersect with sustainable operations. By mixing mature and emerging terms, researchers are exploring how digitalisation reshapes traditional frameworks – theorising digital tools not just as external trends but as internal resources that drive resilience, transparency and performance. This shift reveals that scholars are anchoring their work in proven operational fundamentals while testing new digital ideas that move beyond old, static definitions of a resource. As a result, digital transformation is no longer on the sidelines; it is now central to how researchers define competitive advantage. This pattern proves that RBV scholarship is not just borrowing tech terminology but actively updating its core logic to accommodate modern, technology-enabled capabilities.

Density analysis: The data shows a clear contrast between traditional and emerging topics. Well-established terms like sustainability form a large, bright core on the map because they appear in a large volume of papers (TLS = 385, f = 200, C_avg = 22.80), showing that classic concepts still anchor this research. In contrast, newer digital terms like circular economy (TLS = 173, C_avg = 37.94) and artificial intelligence (TLS = 145, C_avg = 51.21) appear in fewer papers overall but boast much higher average citation rates. However, despite their strong citation influence, these digital terms appear in cooler-density regions because their frequency and link strength are lower than those of foundational RBV terms. Thus, digital transformation is gaining conceptual traction, and emerging digital concepts demonstrate rising scholarly influence through high citation averages, even though they do not yet form bright density hotspots on the map.

Overlay analysis: Within this cluster, classic competitive positioning concepts establish the historical foundation. Terms such as competitive advantage (Y_avg = 2023.42) appear consistently across earlier periods, shaded in cooler tones that reflect their long-standing presence in the RBV literature. This baseline transitions sharply into an exceptionally warm snapshot of the most recent years driven by the strong visual connectivity of digital transformation (Y_avg = 2024.38). This connection reveals a clear pattern of strategic adaptation. Scholars are moving beyond old, physical-asset frameworks to explore how companies maintain a competitive edge using flexible, digital setups. The visual link between traditional competitive metrics and new digital terms proves that RBV’s core vocabulary is getting a digital upgrade, shifting the focus from fixed physical configurations to flexible digital capabilities.

Density analysis: Density mapping shows that conceptual prominence in this cluster is heavily anchored by digital transformation, which forms a major high-density hotspot on the map due to its high frequency and network connectivity (TLS = 267, f = 176). On the other hand, classic concepts like competitive advantage remain strongly connected to other words on the map (TLS = 264) but hold a lower baseline citation impact (C_avg = 18.65). This gap shows that while classic strategic terms remain necessary to hold the network together, the actual field-level conceptual expansion is largely driven by papers that explore how companies digitise their assets.

Overlay analysis: Comprising a highly integrated block of 25 dedicated keywords, the cluster tracks how environmental capability theory has evolved over time. Core terms such as natural resource-based view (Y_avg = 2023.68), environmental performance (Y_avg = 2023.71) and sustainable development (Y_avg = 2023.75) anchor the cluster in the middle of the studied timeline, reflecting that NRBV vocabulary is already well-established within RBV scholarship. In contrast, newer terms like green innovation (Y_avg = 2024.12) and sustainable performance (Y_avg = 2024.27) are shaded in warm tones, signalling recent research interest and thematic expansion. The resulting timeline maps out a clear path in which foundational environmental concepts remain central while expanding into proactive innovation and corporate performance domains. Rather than changing RBV’s basic logic, researchers are broadening its scope to include non-financial value, such as ecological stewardship. The map shows that RBV is increasingly used to view sustainability as a core strategic capability embedded in daily company routines, rather than just basic regulatory compliance. Such a layout demonstrates how the theory adapts to include wider definitions of advantage in response to environmental and societal pressures.

Density analysis: The entire topic group displays a well-distributed, high-impact citation footprint across the network. Core NRBV terms such as environmental performance (C_avg = 34.47), green innovation (C_avg = 31.48) and natural resource-based view (C_avg = 31.01) appear in heavily cited documents, but their density colours are moderate because their frequency and link strength are lower than those of the most frequently occurring RBV terms. In contrast, related side topics, such as financial performance (C_avg = 20.24), attract fewer citations and appear with lighter shading. The strong citation footprint of NRBV terms reflects scholarly influence, while their density shading indicates moderate occurrence rather than high-density prominence. A highly cited core evidently supports these newer, developing offshoots. The foundational environmental terms are mature and widely respected, as evidenced by their remarkably high average citation scores (all well above the 25.0 threshold). Steady citation accumulation across the data set demonstrates that green management vocabulary has successfully consolidated its footprint and holds deep academic authority in modern strategy research.

Overlay analysis: Institutional and legitimacy-seeking behaviours form the core foundation of this cluster. Terms such as corporate social responsibility (Y_avg = 2023.56) and stakeholder theory (Y_avg = 2023.56) appear consistently throughout the time period, shaded in cooler tones that reflect their long-standing presence in RBV scholarship. Grounding the cluster in these terms establishes a stable baseline focused on how regulatory and societal acceptance creates resource advantages. By comparison, terms like institutional theory (Y_avg = 2023.69) transition towards the middle years of the timeline. Such a shift indicates an active conceptual bridge where institutional rules are being linked to broader strategic actions. Mixing mature and newer terms shows that researchers are expanding the theory into diverse new settings, using RBV to explain how companies build internal capabilities while managing strict corporate governance rules and complex stakeholder expectations.

Density analysis: While density mapping positions these terms in moderately dense green bands rather than the absolute centre of the network, the underlying matrix reveals that the primary conceptual influence in this cluster belongs to corporate social responsibility (C_avg = 30.58) and stakeholder theory (C_avg = 30.24), with both terms drawing heavy attention in the literature. Meanwhile, institutional theory acts as a connector to newer topics, receiving moderate citation support (C_avg = 17.36). The resulting pattern demonstrates that traditional concepts focused on legal compliance and stakeholder alignment remain dominant drivers of citation volume. Focusing on these core terms highlights how non-financial assets – such as a strong reputation, ethical governance and community trust – act as defensible resources that lower regulatory risk and insulate firms from market competition.

Overlay analysis: Serving as the primary structural anchor of the entire co-occurrence network, the cluster represents the data set’s theoretical engine. Historical baselines such as internationalisation (Y_avg = 2023.15) and the parent construct, RBV (Y_avg = 2023.44), are shaded in cooler tones, reflecting their concentration in older publications. The profile climbs rapidly into middle and later temporal periods through the prominent co-occurrence of innovation (Y_avg = 2023.63) and dynamic capabilities (Y_avg = 2023.87). The temporal profile reflects RBV’s ongoing adaptation to dynamic, knowledge-intensive environments. Scholars are retooling dynamic capability constructs to theorise how firms sense, seize and reconfigure resources within digital ecosystems, collaborative networks and volatile market conditions. The cluster sits at the intersection of theory and application, where RBV’s static resource logic is being stretched to accommodate agility, learning and inter-organisational exchange. Rather than discarding RBV’s foundational principles, researchers are embedding them within capability-based frameworks that emphasise responsiveness and renewal. The overlay map reveals a high-recency, high-agility trajectory, showing how RBV is evolving to explain strategic behaviour in contexts marked by rapid change and technological disruption. Thus, one finds evidence that thematic clusters mature not only through vocabulary expansion but also through conceptual reconfiguration, in which resource advantage is increasingly defined by a firm’s ability to adapt, learn and innovate.

Density analysis: Density mapping shows a heavy concentration of keyword connections, reflecting high frequency and strong co-occurrence. The central keyword, resource-based view, holds the highest number of connections to other terms across the entire data set (TLS = 1,521, f = 1,158, C_avg = 20.97). The core baseline is supported by prominent keywords like innovation (TLS = 279, C_avg = 21.01) and dynamic capabilities (TLS = 261, C_avg = 19.17). Such data validates that combining internal resources with adaptability remains a highly researched and heavily cited area of strategy. For example, scholars frequently pair these terms in empirical studies of how firms manage cross-border knowledge transfers or how technological disruption affects long-term organisational survival. The strong density signal indicates high frequency and co-occurrence, indicating that the academic field continues to rely on these foundational concepts to examine how internal knowledge translates into market responsiveness.

Overlay analysis: Spanning a broad block of 40 keywords, the cluster captures how small businesses apply resource concepts when operating with limited funding or materials. Terms such as entrepreneurial orientation (Y_avg = 2023.28) and firm performance (Y_avg = 2023.64) establish a mature baseline, while keywords like SMEs (Y_avg = 2023.69) and emerging markets (Y_avg = 2023.82) show a transition towards warmer tones, signalling recent research interest. The timeline indicates that research into business mindsets is expanding rapidly, especially in response to post-pandemic market shifts. Scholars rely on RBV to explore how entrepreneurial traits help companies deploy limited resources to gain a competitive advantage. The mapping highlights a clear shift where researchers take standard resource principles and test them in fast-changing environments, such as developing economies. Such a layout demonstrates how the core theory adapts to explain business survival outside traditional, resource-rich corporate and developed-country settings.

Density analysis: Density mapping reveals a concentrated area of academic focus centred directly on firm performance (C_avg = 26.34) and SMEs (TLS = 431, f = 239, C_avg = 22.72). In contrast, geographic topics like emerging markets appear with lighter density on the outer edges of the map and hold a lower citation footprint (C_avg = 14.05). The data points to an uneven distribution of academic impact. While general small-business performance concepts are highly cited, specific geographic applications are still building scholarly traction. For instance, strategic papers that track how small firms innovate generally receive heavy citation, whereas studies limited to specific developing-nation markets are still steadily accumulating citation weight. The trend illustrates how the vocabulary expands into new real-world settings before those specific geographic niches fully consolidate their citation footprint.

Overlay analysis: Representing an isolated, individual keyword focus, entrepreneurship (Y_avg = 2024.00) is shaded in the warmest tones across the sector, indicating its heavy concentration in recent publications. A highly recent timeline reflects an emerging trend where researchers apply RBV to early-stage start-ups and new business ventures. Compared with older clusters built on long-standing corporate vocabularies, the entrepreneurship node sits on the map’s outer edges as an emerging topic. Scholars are actively exploring how resource logic functions during the actual launch of a business. Instead of studying large, established corporations, researchers focus on how resource bootstrapping – such as using personal savings or sharing equipment – can serve as distinct advantages at the nascent and developing stages of an entrepreneurial venture. For example, empirical studies examine how software start-ups leverage flexible founder skills rather than large capital investments to survive initial market entry. Future mapping will likely see these terms merge with agility and innovation as early-stage ventures navigate unpredictable economic environments. Testing RBV in these newer, resource-scarce terrains challenges traditional asset-based definitions of competitive advantage.

Density analysis: Consistent with its isolated visual position on the map, entrepreneurship appears in papers with lower citation averages (TLS = 120, f = 69, C_avg = 11.77), resulting in the lightest shading in the density view. An emerging, low-impact citation pattern indicates that the vocabulary is still developing and has not yet built up widespread citation weight. Tracking early-stage concepts provides a view of how RBV expands into fresh research niches before those ideas fully consolidate their citation footprint. For instance, studies on how newly founded firms build capabilities during a market crisis are intellectually novel but require time to be widely read and cited across the broader RBV literature.

The overlay and density visualisations together reveal that RBV’s thematic vocabulary is evolving through three distinct trajectories: core renewal, emergent experimentation and stable influence. Central keywords such as digital transformation and dynamic capabilities show dual prominence – as both recent and highly cited – indicating active theorisation and strong scholarly uptake. In contrast, newer constructs like entrepreneurship appear in recent publications but have yet to accumulate major citation weight, reflecting early-stage experimentation on the map’s outer edges. Meanwhile, mature terms such as competitive advantage, corporate social responsibility and stakeholder theory retain high citation impact despite lower recency, underscoring their continued relevance as conceptual anchors. A dual-lens analysis confirms that recency and impact do not always align at the term level. While new keywords highlight trending topics, long-term academic impact still rests on classic terms that connect the entire map as the framework expands into new fields.

The dual-lens trajectories identified in the integrative synthesis suggest a clear agenda for extending organisational capability theory. To guide future empirical and qualitative research, four distinct research questions are proposed based on the structural shifts observed in the analysis.

Research question 1 (core renewal):

Research question 2 (emergent experimentation):

Research question 3 (stable influence):

Research question 4 (contextual boundary shifts):

For corporate decision-makers, the rapid evolution of the keyword network highlights the risk of relying purely on fixed, physical resource configurations. Value creation increasingly depends on data-driven agility and proactive ecological stewardship. SME managers operating in resource-constrained emerging markets should avoid heavy investments in physical infrastructure. Capital is more effectively deployed towards flexible, cloud-based digital tools and localised knowledge networks. Building these relational and digital capabilities allows small businesses to navigate post-pandemic supply chain disruptions, lower transaction costs and respond rapidly to sudden shifts in consumer demand without requiring large upfront capital outlays.

This study contributes to RBV scholarship in four substantive ways. Firstly, it advances understanding of RBV’s intellectual trajectory by categorising its discourse into core, experimental and emergent clusters. Secondly, it highlights the divergence between recency and citation impact, showing that some clusters exhibit strong overlay but low density, while others show high density despite limited recency. Thirdly, it demonstrates the value of a theory-specific bibliometric synthesis — an approach that integrates structural patterns (networks, clusters and citation trajectories) with thematic evolution (conceptual categories, emergent constructs and domain applications), thereby offering a forward-looking lens on the theory’s trajectory and relevance.

Finally, the results from the bibliometric synthesis directly contribute to ongoing discussions in journals such as the International Journal of Organizational Analysis, in areas including artificial intelligence, intercultural communication, circular economy, green management, corporate governance, process automation and technologies such as blockchain. The empirical asymmetry in the results, where artificial intelligence commands high citation authority while entrepreneurship remains an emergent, low-density frontier, explains why rigid managerial participation suppresses operational experimentation while high-impact digital assets require decentralised coordination configurations to realise strategic value (Fang et al., 2025). The thematic mapping results empirically validate the conceptual integration of digital adoption, sustainable manufacturing and circular economy capabilities by indicating that these domains are converging into a unified, high-impact capability cluster within contemporary scholarship, with sustainability forming the traditional core and recent technological innovations in organisations generating the highest field-level citation momentum (Bag and Pretorius, 2022). The empirical analysis clarifies that dynamic capabilities and digital transformation are now fused as interconnected anchors of core renewal, and that digital reconfiguration within an organisation is treated as an enduring internal capability routine rather than a transient, outsourced event (Schlegel and Kraus, 2023). The results also affirm that workplace trust in corporate governance is a core pillar of organisational resilience and survival and plays a vital role in building the firm’s capacity to manage risk and protect its long-term business value creation (Ashta et al., 2025). The synthesis highlights that technologies like blockchain are highly recent but have a low absolute citation footprint, reflecting observations that organisations have yet to develop mature capability routines (Chillakuri and Attili, 2022). On the other hand, bibliometric mapping reinforces the idea that green management has consolidated into mature, high-impact anchors within the strategy literature and is now embedded in the discourse on sustainable organisations (Abu Assedeh, 2026).

Several limitations should be acknowledged. Firstly, the data set was restricted to the Web of Science Core Collection, which, although authoritative, excludes potentially relevant works indexed in Scopus, Google Scholar or regional databases. Future research could address these limitations by expanding database coverage, incorporating altimetric and other metrics to capture early visibility and conducting longitudinal analyses that track thematic clusters beyond 2025.

The study set out to address the fragmented treatment of RBV in prior bibliometric reviews by offering a theory-aligned synthesis grounded in dual-lens analysis. The findings underscore the importance of examining RBV not as a static framework but as a dynamic construct that adapts to digitalisation, sustainability and emerging-market contexts. For practitioners and policymakers, the results highlight how RBV’s evolving vocabulary informs strategies of resilience, ecological stewardship and competitive advantage in turbulent environments.

Shankar T. Naskar is an Assistant Professor of Entrepreneurship and Innovation, University of Virginia’s College at Wise, USA. He holds a PhD in Entrepreneurship from the University of Louisville, USA, and an MBA from the University of Utah, USA. His research spans entrepreneurship, psychology, strategy, pedagogy and human resources, with publications in Applied Psychology, International Journal of Production Economics, International Entrepreneurship and Management Journal, Management Review Quarterly, Journal of Management History and other leading interdisciplinary journals. Shankar currently serves as an Associate Editor for Global Business and Organizational Excellence and the Journal of the International Council for Small Business.

José M. Merigó is a Professor at the School of Computer Science at the Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology at the University of Technology Sydney (Australia). He holds a Master’s and a PhD degree from the University of Barcelona. He has published more than 500 articles in journals, books and conference proceedings. Since 2015, Clarivate Analytics has recognised him as a Highly Cited Researcher in Computer Science (2015–2020) and Cross-Field (2021–2024). He has appeared in the Stanford/Elsevier Top 2% Scientists List, Research.com, ScholarGPS and AD Scientific Index. He is currently interested in decision-making, aggregation operators, computational intelligence and bibliometrics.