Green Finance: From a Fragmented Literature to an Integrated Conceptual Framework

Green finance has emerged as an important field of research and policy but remains conceptually diverse, particularly in relation to sustainable finance and related concepts. This study systematically examines the evolution and conceptual structure of the green finance literature and develops an integrated conceptual framework for green finance. The research design involves a three-stage workflow combining bibliometric mapping of 10,662 Web of Science and Scopus publications, a multi-criteria Article Relevance Index (ARI) for article selection, and qualitative full-text analysis of 209 articles supported by AI-assisted extraction and researcher validation. The bibliometric analysis reveals a rapidly expanding but conceptually fragmented field, with 94% of occurrences of 15 representative author keywords concentrated in 2020–2026. Full-text analysis identifies five interrelated defining attributes of green finance. The results show that green finance occupies a distinct position within the broader sustainable finance domain, with green financing as its narrower operational component, while climate finance and ESG finance remain related but distinct concepts. These findings are integrated into a conceptual framework that represents green finance as an interconnected system of defining attributes, conceptual relationships, and boundaries, supporting more consistent interpretation and future operationalization.