Purpose – This paper presents a systematic review of the literature in the domain of maritime disruption
management, upon which future research framework and agenda are proposed. Two review questions, i.e. the
measures that are employed to manage disruptions and how these contribute to resilience performance, were
pursued.
Design/methodology/approach – The systematic literature review procedure was strictly followed,
including identification and planning, execution, selection, and synthesis and analysis. A review protocol was
developed, including scope, databases and criteria guiding the review. Following this, 47 articles were
eventually extracted for the systematic review to identify themes for not only addressing the review questions
but also highlighting future research opportunities.
Findings – It was found that earlier studies mainly focused on measures, which are designed using
mathematical models, management frameworks and other technical support systems, to analyse and evaluate
risks, and their impacts on maritime players at the levels of organisation, transport system and region in which
the organisation is embedded. There is, however, a lack of research that empirically examines how these
measures would contribute to enhancing the resilience performance of maritime firms and their organisational
performance as a whole. Subsequently, a Digitally Embedded and Technically Support Maritime Disruption
Management (DEST-MDM) model is proposed.
Research limitations/implications – This review is constrained by studies recorded by the Web of Science
only. Nevertheless, the proposed research model would expectedly contribute to enhancing knowledge
building in the specific domain of maritime disruption management and supply chain management overall
while providing meaningful managerial implications to policymakers and managers in the maritime industry.
Originality/value – This research is perhaps one of the first studies which presents a systematic review of
literature in maritime disruption management, and proposes a future research framework that establishes the
link between disruption management and resilience and organisational performance for empirical validation.
Keywords Disruption management, Maritime industry, Maritime supply chain, Systematic literature review