Sustainability in the United States and China: A Cross-Country Comparison of the Literature

Sustainability research has seen tremendous growth as a field of study in recent years, evolving and changing in scope along the way. In this review, we track the growth and development of sustainability from 1980 to 2024 within the academic literature, utilize a comparison of works conducted with U.S.- and Chinese-based samples to demonstrate how different countries may influence sustainability practices, and outline possible areas for future research on this topic. As the largest economies in the world and the largest emitters of greenhouse gases, the U.S. and China can have a substantial impact on reducing climate change if they commit to sustainability. Articles for this review were acquired using a Scopus search for titles containing “sustainability AND China” and also titles containing “sustainability AND United States”, with years set to 1980–2024. It was also supplemented by a Google Scholar search for studies based in the U.S. and China. This review provides an overall comparison of the two literatures on sustainability from the U.S. and China. Ethical implications of sustainability in the U.S. and China are discussed. It appears that China is clearly positioned to lead the world in clean energy production, both by installing sustainable energy domestically and by selling such technology (e.g., solar) to other countries, because the Chinese government has prioritized this effort. The U.S. has made progress on the clean energy front, but that progress varies depending on the level of commitment from the federal government and may need to be driven by market and consumer demand. We hope that this review will aid in stimulating further investigation to advance the underlying research streams that we identify in this review, along with broadening the focus of sustainability to the global scale.