Akıllı kent, Sürdürülebilirlik ve Kentsel Dirençlilik Araştırmalarının Sistematik Bibliyometrik Analizi

In recent years, cities have been facing multidimensional and interrelated challenges, including the increasingly evident impacts of climate change, rapid urbanization, population growth, the depletion of natural resources, environmental degradation, the diversification of disaster risks, and growing socioeconomic vulnerabilities. These global transformations have necessitated a reassessment of existing urban planning and management approaches and have increased the importance of research focusing on reconceptualizing cities as structures capable of adapting to changing conditions, managing their resources efficiently, and sustainably improving quality of life. In this context, sustainability, urban resilience, and smart city approaches have emerged as fundamental and complementary concepts in contemporary urban planning literature. While the sustainable urbanization approach aims to establish a balanced relationship between economic development, environmental protection, and social well-being, the urban resilience approach focuses on the capacity of cities to maintain their essential functions, adapt, and transform in response to unexpected shocks and long-term pressures. The smart city approach, on the other hand, aims to enhance the efficiency of urban services, optimize resource utilization, and make decision-making processes data-driven by integrating the opportunities offered by information and communication technologies into urban planning and management processes. Today, there is a growing consensus that these three approaches should be addressed in an integrated manner toward common objectives rather than being evaluated independently. In particular, with the advancement of digital technologies, smart city solutions are increasingly recognized as making significant contributions to the implementation of sustainability goals and the enhancement of urban resilience. Although numerous studies in the literature address smart cities, sustainability, and urban resilience separately, research examining these three concepts through an integrated approach remains limited. In recent years, there has been a significant increase in the number of studies addressing these concepts collectively, particularly within the frameworks of climate change, disaster risk management, energy efficiency, digital transformation, data-driven governance, nature-based solutions, and the Sustainable Development Goals. Nevertheless, bibliometric studies that comprehensively reveal the historical development of this research field, scientific production trends, influential researchers, leading countries, collaboration networks, and conceptual transformation remain insufficient. This situation highlights the need for a systematic assessment of the scientific development of the field.

Bibliometric analysis is an effective method for examining the development of a specific research field through quantitative data and identifying patterns of scientific production, research trends, citation relationships, collaboration networks, and conceptual structures. By enabling the simultaneous evaluation of publication output, citation performance, contributions by countries and institutions, keyword relationships, and thematic development processes, bibliometric analysis provides valuable insights into determining the current state and future directions of research fields. In this respect, the method not only facilitates the quantitative assessment of scientific knowledge produced in the past but also enables the identification of research topics that are likely to gain prominence in the future.

The primary aim of this study is to examine the development dynamics of the international scientific literature on smart cities, sustainability, and urban resilience through bibliometric analysis and to reveal the knowledge structure, research trends, and conceptual transformation of the field. Within this scope, studies indexed in the Web of Science Core Collection database were analyzed to identify publication performance by year, citation patterns, influential journals, authors, countries, and institutions. International scientific collaboration networks, keyword networks, conceptual structures, thematic evolution, and research trends were evaluated using the Biblioshiny software. Thus, the study aims to provide a comprehensive overview of the current state of scientific production in the fields of smart cities, sustainability, and urban resilience, while establishing a guiding framework for future research.