The deterrent effect of environmental judicature on firms' pollution emissions: Evidence from a quasi-natural experiment in China

IF 5.2 1区经济学 Q1 ECONOMICS

中国经济评论 Pub Date : 2024-10-11 DOI:10.1016/j.chieco.2024.102291

Peng Zhou , Xiaoqi Huang , Frank M. Song

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引用次数: 0

Abstract

This paper investigates the deterrent effect of environmental judicature on firms' pollution emissions. Regarding the establishment of environmental courts (ECs) in China as a quasi-natural experiment, our staggered Difference-in-Differences (DID) estimation shows that strengthening environmental judicature has a negative, causal effect on firms' pollution emissions. The exogenous establishment of ECs decreases industrial firms' pollution emission intensity by approximately 7.8 %. Heterogeneity analysis shows that the negative effect of ECs on pollution emissions is particularly salient for firms in regions with weak environmental awareness, firms in industries with low competition, and firms with a high intensity of pollution emissions. Mechanism analysis indicates that the establishment of ECs enhances environmental justice and increases environmental violation costs, thereby having a deterrent effect on firms' pollution emissions. To comply with the more stringent environmental judicature, firms located in cities with ECs may temporarily cut their production, use more clean energy and buy more desulfurization equipment. In the long term, they may engage in more green and cooperative innovations, further substantiating the deterrent impact of stringent environmental judicature. Our findings can offer valuable insights for corporate green transformation and government pollution control.

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环境司法对企业污染排放的威慑效应：来自中国准自然实验的证据

本文研究了环境司法对企业污染排放的威慑作用。将中国设立环保法庭（ECs）作为一个准自然实验，我们的交错差分法（DID）估计表明，加强环境司法对企业的污染排放具有负向因果效应。外生设立环境委员会会使工业企业的污染排放强度降低约 7.8%。异质性分析表明，对于环境意识薄弱地区的企业、低竞争行业的企业以及高污染排放强度的企业而言，环境司法对污染排放的负效应尤为突出。机制分析表明，环境管理委员会的设立加强了环境正义，增加了环境违法成本，从而对企业的污染排放产生了威慑作用。为了遵守更严格的环境司法，位于设立环境管理委员会的城市的企业可能会暂时削减产量，使用更多清洁能源，购买更多脱硫设备。从长远来看，这些企业可能会进行更多的绿色创新和合作创新，从而进一步证实了严格环境司法的威慑性影响。我们的研究结果可为企业绿色转型和政府污染控制提供有价值的启示。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

中国经济评论 ECONOMICS-

CiteScore

10.60

自引率

4.40%

发文量

380

期刊介绍： The China Economic Review publishes original works of scholarship which add to the knowledge of the economy of China and to economies as a discipline. We seek, in particular, papers dealing with policy, performance and institutional change. Empirical papers normally use a formal model, a data set, and standard statistical techniques. Submissions are subjected to double-blind peer review.