Exploring external and internal pressures on the environmental behavior of paper enterprises in China: A qualitative study

Abstract

AbstractAs one of the typical high‐polluting and high‐energy‐consuming industries in China, the paper industry's environmental behavior has become the focus of a range of stakeholders, policy makers, and the whole society because the industry's business activities are a main source of environmental pollution and contribute to massive energy consumption. This study used a qualitative approach to examine the relative importance of external and internal pressures (EP and IP) in driving the environmental behavior of paper enterprises in China. Based on grounded theory, this study aimed to examine the EP and IP on the environmental behavior of paper enterprises to create a comprehensive theoretical model based on grounded theory code analysis. It was found that government pressure, economic pressure, social pressure, and IP have direct and significant positive effects on the corporate environmental behavior (CEB) of paper enterprises in China. Furthermore, government, economic, and social pressures have indirect and significant positive effects on CEB through other pressures. Finally, the paper concludes with a discussion of these four pressures and provides policy implications.