A Bibliometric and Thematic Evolution Analysis of Intellectual Property and Environmental Research

This study examines the intellectual development and thematic evolution of research connecting intellectual property and environmental issues. Using bibliometric analysis, it explores how the discourse has expanded from normative legal studies toward interdisciplinary research integrating innovation, policy, and technology. The dataset was collected from the Scopus database using the search query (“intellectual property”) AND (“environmental”), yielding 268 valid documents published between 1989 and 2025. Data were analyzed using the Bibliophagy package in R to identify publication trends, citation patterns, productive authors, influential journals, and conceptual structures based on co-occurrence, co-authorship, and thematic evolution mapping. The findings reveal a significant growth of publications in recent years, particularly after 2015, with China, the United States, and the United Kingdom emerging as the leading contributors. Prominent journals such as Technological Forecasting and Social Change and Journal of Environmental Economics and Management serve as key outlets for this domain. The thematic structure identifies intellectual property rights, innovation, and China as the dominant motor themes, reflecting the growing importance of intellectual property in driving environmental innovation and governance. Earlier themes, such as environmental protection, industrial economics, and biodiversity have evolved into broader frameworks incorporating patents, technological development, and green innovation policies.