China faces serious earthquake risks because of its location between major active seismic belts. As a result, seismic risk management has long been a major concern for government agencies, researchers, engineers, and communities.
A study published in Risk Sciences reviews how Chinese research on this topic has developed, using bibliometric analysis and knowledge graph visualization to trace the field’s progress and changing areas of interest.
The authors examined Chinese literature related to famine relief, seismic risk management, earthquake disaster management, seismic resilience, and earthquake resilience. By visualizing keyword networks and research trends, the study shows that China’s understanding of disaster response has deep historical roots.
Earlier work on famine relief focused on policies and measures for responding to natural disasters, while modern seismic risk management has gradually expanded to include disaster prevention, emergency response, reconstruction, insurance, risk assessment, logistics, rescue, and collaborative governance.
The study finds that research on seismic risk management has moved through several major themes. Earlier modern studies focused mainly on earthquake disaster management. Later, attention shifted toward catastrophe risk management, followed by increasing emphasis on emergency management. More recent research trends include disaster management, earthquake vulnerability, emergency management, and disaster risk management.
The paper also compares seismic risk management with seismic resilience. The two fields overlap, especially in engineering measures that aim to improve the seismic capacity of structures and components. However, seismic risk management covers a broader range of issues, including non-engineering measures such as insurance and emergency coordination. Seismic resilience research places stronger emphasis on functionality, recovery, adaptation, transformation, and reorganization after earthquakes.
The authors suggest that future research should not separate seismic risk management and seismic resilience too sharply. Instead, they argue that seismic risk management should strengthen its engineering foundations while also paying more attention to how affected systems recover and adapt.
The study also highlights the role of collaborative governance in bringing together knowledge and expertise from public and private sectors, helping to build a more comprehensive earthquake disaster management system.
Risk Sciences
Data/statistical analysis
Not applicable
Seismic risk management in China: A bibliometric analysis
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.