Integrating Resilience and Sustainability in Manufacturing: Enablers, Barriers, and Measurement Approaches

Abstract

Resilience and sustainability (R&S) are critical capabilities, yet their integration remains poorly understood with fragmented theoretical perspectives and limited empirical evidence. This systematic literature review synthesises 65 empirical studies on R&S integration in manufacturing contexts and presents a structured multi-level framework. Through bibliometric mapping and qualitative content analysis we trace intellectual structure and extract integration mechanisms, enablers, and barriers. Results reveal four key findings: First, R&S demonstrate bidirectional causality, resilience enables sustainability while sustainability practices build resilience, challenging linear perspectives. Second, enablers operate across nine categories. Third, barriers represent paradoxical effects where traditional strengths become liabilities beyond optimal thresholds. Fourth, approximately 64% of R&S relationships operate indirectly through mediating mechanisms. The study contributes a multi-level taxonomy of integration mechanisms and a socio-technical framework capturing enabler-barrier interactions across organisational levels. Findings reflect synthesis of empirical evidence rather than primary empirical testing, and generalisability is bounded by the corpus' geographic and methodological composition. For practitioners, results offer actionable guidance for capability bundling, risk governance, and performance monitoring through circular economy practices and digital dashboards. We propose future research highlighting longitudinal causal inference, cross-level alignment, and social sustainability integration under disruption.