Mapping China’s evolving approach to seismic risk management

Fig. (a) clusters arranged according to size; (b) keywords for the top 10 clusters arranged horizontally on the timeline.

FAYETTEVILLE, GA, UNITED STATES, July 17, 2026 /EINPresswire.com/ -- A bibliometric analysis of Chinese literature traces how seismic risk management research in China has evolved from historical disaster relief studies to modern themes such as emergency management, earthquake vulnerability, disaster risk management, collaborative governance, and seismic resilience. The study highlights changing research priorities and points to future directions for strengthening resilience-oriented earthquake disaster management.

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.

References
DOI
10.1016/j.risk.2026.100053

Original Source URL
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.risk.2026.100053

Funding Information
This work was supported by the Scientific Research Fund of the Institute of Engineering Mechanics, China Earthquake Administration, and the National Natural Science Foundation of China.

Lucy Wang
BioDesign Research
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