Fiscal decentralization, local government behavior and environmental pollution: Evidence from "Province-Managing-County" reform in China.

Autor: Yang J; School of Government, Peking University, Beijing, 100091, China., Yu D; College of Architecture and Art, North China University of Technology, Beijing, 100144, China., Guan Z; School of Public Administration, University of Economics and Law, Wuhan, Hubei, 430073, China. Electronic address: guanzh215@zuel.edu.cn.
Jazyk: angličtina
Zdroj: Journal of environmental management [J Environ Manage] 2024 Dec 26; Vol. 373, pp. 123572. Date of Electronic Publication: 2024 Dec 26.
DOI: 10.1016/j.jenvman.2024.123572
Abstrakt: The impact of fiscal decentralization on environmental pollution is a widely debated topic that remains inconclusive. Central to this discussion is whether local governments pursue a "race to the top" or "race to the bottom" competitive strategy. The environmental federalism theory provides insight into this dynamic within federal system but falls short in explaining similar phenomenon in non-federal systems. This study utilized a quasi-experiment originated from the "Province-Managing-County" reform in China spanning from 1997 to 2017 to explore the impact of fiscal decentralization on environmental pollution. The findings reveal that the "Province-Managing-County" reform resulted in a general exacerbation of environmental pollution, the PM 2.5 concentration in pilot areas increased by 2.894 μg/m3, but the effect exhibits heterogeneity in terms of different time and space. Subsequent analysis uncovered that the institutional environment and competitive endowments significantly influenced the enviromental governance of local governments, while the promotion motivation of main officials does not exhibit significant effect. This study offers a precise assessment of the impact of fiscal decentralization on regional environmental governance and sheds light on the diverse outcomes reported in prior studies. Furthermore, this study provides useful policy recommendations such as strengthening "regulatory principle" of environmental pollution behavior, following the "balance principle" of fiscal and decentralization powers and adhering to the "differentiation principle" of adapting to local conditions to enhance environmental governance.
Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare the following financial interests/personal relationships which may be considered as potential competing interests:Zhen Guan reports financial support was provided by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No.72304284) and the 76th batch of grant from China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (2024M763687). If there are other authors, they declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
(Copyright © 2024 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)
Databáze: MEDLINE
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