Industrial Diffusion Processes in Peri-Urban Environments: A State-of-the-Art Analysis of Current and Future Dimensions

Various scientific disciplines (economics, geography, sociology, urban planning, and environmental sciences) have analysed industrialization processes in peri-urban environments. This has given rise to a wide and diverse bibliography on which this bibliometric study, using the most advanced computer tools, offers a comprehensive overview that helps to structure existing knowledge. To this end, the Web of Science and Scopus databases were used, which, after applying inclusion and exclusion criteria and detecting duplicate works, identified a total of 626 documents involving 1484 authors. The results identify two basic lines of research, each relating to the processes of urbanization and industrialization. They also show that, since the approval of the SDGs by the UN in 2015, studies on industrialization in peri-urban environments have been growing significantly. Chinese scientific output stands out among the proliferation of these works. This study also offers a dynamic view of the lines of work that could experience greater future development and that are associated with the challenges inherent in the processes of urbanization and industrialization. Among the former are problems arising from migration or access to housing; among the latter are the challenges of land use transformation, environmental problems, and those linked to inequality.