Following the COVID-19 pandemic, financial resilience has received more academic and societal attention. However, a cohesive understanding, an accepted definition and a consistent measurement scale of this concept do not exist. This study aims to synthesise the literature on financial resilience by examining its research trends, methodologies, designs and themes. Furthermore, a framework outlining the antecedents and consequences of financial resilience is presented, along with an agenda for future research.
Using a systematic literature review, the authors identified 155 articles from Scopus, published up until December 2023. This review presents the themes, theories and components of financial resilience, as well as publication trends over time and the countries where financial resilience is researched.
This review found three broad research domains: individual, organisational and governmental financial resilience. All three domains define financial resilience as the ability to bounce back from financial shocks, but the government literature also incorporates bouncing forward, illustrating a gap in the individual and organisational literature. Two key aspects of financial resilience are accessing financial resources and developing new capabilities to overcome deficiencies.
To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to review existing research on financial resilience. One of its contributions is to present a universal definition of financial resilience. The authors also examine the antecedents and consequences of financial resilience as outlined in the literature.
