Does executive turnover affect government transparency? Leadership changes and environmental information disclosure in Chinese cities

Abstract

Research has underscored the role of executive turnover in organizational processes and outcomes. However, little research has linked turnover events to externally oriented outcomes such as government transparency, and most studies are set in Western countries. Focusing on an authoritarian context, we theorize how new executives are likely to focus on issues that align with expectations from powerful stakeholders and turnover events provide windows of opportunities for organizational changes. Using panel data from 113 Chinese cities, this article explores the impact of executive turnover on government transparency in environmental information. Results show that mayoral and party secretaries’ turnover positively affects government environmental transparency. This effect is contingent on the career stages of the successors and local pollution levels. Our results show divergence in moderating effects across mayoral turnover and party secretary turnover. Implications for research on executive turnover and government transparency in an authoritarian one-party political system are discussed.