Environmental Responsibility Performance Research Articles

High‐Speed Rail Opening and Corporate Environmental Responsibility Performance: Analysis of Talent Aggregation and Supervisory Pressure

ABSTRACTThe existing literature has explored the impact of high‐speed rail (HSR) opening on macrolevel environmental performance. However, few studies have validated its effects on microlevel corporate environmental responsibility performance. Therefore, on the basis of data from Chinese A‐share listed companies from 2011 to 2020, we examine the relationship between HSR opening and corporate environmental responsibility performance, along with the underlying reasons for this relationship. Our research reveals that HSR opening can significantly improve the corporate environmental responsibility performance. Talent aggregation and supervisory pressure constitute the two main channels that explain the positive relationship. Furthermore, the results of heterogeneity tests indicate that this positive effect is more significant in cities with larger populations and administrative centers, as well as in nonpolluting industries and companies certified through ISO14001 environmental management systems. This paper confirms that HSR opening contributes to generating positive externalities for firms and provides valuable insights into improving and understanding corporate environmental responsibility performance.

Dual driving forces for corporate environmental responsibility performance: The synergistic effects of government environmental regulation and market multi-agent green supervision

The 26th United Nations Climate Change Conference reached a series of agreements on implementing the Paris Agreement, empowering governments to independently establish emission reduction goals and encouraging market participants to invest in sustainable development. It highlighted that enhancing corporate environmental responsibility performance (CERP), driven by the collaborative efforts of government and market forces, is key to achieving global sustainability. In this context, this study is the first attempt to investigate the synergistic effects of government environmental regulation (GER) and market multi-agent green supervision (MGS) on CERP. The findings are as follows. First, GER, encompassing the multidimensional environmental responsibilities of governments, has not effectively spurred CERP. MGS, incorporating the green concerns of diverse investors and intermediaries, serves as a significant catalyst for enhancing CERP. The synergy between GER and MGS, involving multi-stakeholder collaborative governance, plays a significant motivating role in promoting CERP. Second, financing constraints and executives' attention to corporate environmental responsibility (CER) are two key channels through which the synergy between GER and MGS influences CERP. Third, firms located in regions with better economic development, those operating in non-heavily polluting industries, or non-state-owned firms exhibit heightened proactivity in improving CERP under the synergy between GER and MGS. This paper expands research on multi-agent collaborative environmental governance from the regional macro-perspective to the micro-firm level, providing a fresh perspective and theoretical basis. The novel findings offer valuable insights for policymakers and firms, especially in economies similar to China, in containing growing environmental challenges and advancing global sustainability.

The impact of ESG responsibility performance on corporate resilience

Against the backdrop of an increasingly complex and uncertain external corporate environment, how to quickly adjust and recover from external risk shocks and challenges by improving corporate environmental, social, and governance (ESG) responsibility performance has become key to achieving sustainable growth for companies today. Although emerging concepts, such as ESG and corporate resilience have received widespread societal attention, exactly how ESG responsibility performance can enhance development resilience has yet to be sufficiently explained. To this end, this paper explores the mechanisms and characteristics of corporate ESG responsibility performance on corporate resilience, using a sample of 4527 A-share listed companies selected for the ESG rating by China Securities from 2009 to 2021. The study finds that: Firstly, the better the ESG responsibility performance, the more resilient the companies; each unit increase in ESG rating increases the economic value added (EVA) rate of total assets by 0.63% and reduces the risk of corporate bankruptcy by 0.32%, thus increasing corporate resilience. In addition, all three ESG sub-indicators contribute to the improvement of corporate resilience, with corporate governance rating having a more significant impact on corporate resilience. Secondly, the mechanism analysis shows that the level of the investor interaction, intensity of strategy investment, and quality of the government–business relationship play a moderating role in the process of ESG responsibility performance affecting corporate resilience. Thirdly, certain heterogeneous characteristics of ESG responsibility performance affect corporate resilience. Fourthly, there is a lag in the impact of ESG responsibility performance on corporate resilience, with the impact largely disappearing after a four-period lag.

ESG performance and litigation risk

We focus on the relationship between firms’ environmental, social, and governance (ESG) responsibility performance and litigation risk. This study finds that improving firm ESG responsibility performance is conducive to reducing firm litigation risk. At the same time, internal control plays an intermediary role in the impact of firms’ ESG responsibility performance on firm litigation risk. Improving ESG responsibility performance can increase the firms’ internal control mechanisms to reduce litigation risk.

CFO SERVING AS BOARD SECRETARY AND ENTERPRISE SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT PERFORMANCE

This study utilizes data from Chinese A-share listed companies from 2010 to 2020 as research samples to explore the impact of CFOs serving as board secretary on the quality of information disclosure, financing constraints, and enterprise sustainable development performance. The empirical results indicate that CFOs holding the additional role of secretary of the board significantly enhance the financial performance and environmental and social responsibility performance of companies. The quality of information disclosure and financing constraints act as mediators between the dual role of the CFO and sustainable development performance. Heterogeneity analysis finds that in non-state-owned enterprises and small and medium-sized enterprises, the effects of CFOs serving concurrently as secretaries of the board on improving financial performance, environmental social responsibility performance, information disclosure quality, and alleviating financing constraints are more pronounced. The findings of this study delve into the impact of the dual role of CFOs on sustainable development performance, enrich the literature in the relevant field, and provide valuable theoretical basis and practical guidance for the selection and appointment of corporate executives, tailored for journal publication requirements.

Family involvement in management, social trust and the environmental responsibility performance of family firms

Based on the perspective of socioemotional wealth, this paper explores the effect of family involvement in management on environmental responsibility performance and the moderating role of social trust by using the data of Chinese A-share listed family firms from 2010 to 2019. The results show that an increase of family involvement in management significantly improves the environmental responsibility performance of family firms, and a decrease in social trust strengthens the positive effect of family involvement in management on environmental responsibility performance. We further investigate the impact of life cycle stages on the above relationship and find that family involvement in management has the most significant positive effect on environmental responsibility performance and that social trust has the most significant moderating role in mature family firms. Our results demonstrate the importance of socioemotional wealth, external environmental factors and life cycle stages for the environmental responsibility strategies of family managers.

Bank agglomeration and corporate environmental responsibility performance: Evidence from Chinese bank branch data

While corporate environmental responsibility (CER) has attracted widespread attention in recent years, there is still very little understanding as regards whether bank agglomeration affects CER practices. This study has measured the agglomeration of bank branches around Chinese listed enterprises from 2011 to 2020 using Python and the Baidu Map API. For the first time, the study has revealed that, bank agglomeration can have a positive impact on CER practices by reducing financial constraints on enterprises and fostering green business practices. This impact is more significant for private enterprises, enterprises with high costs of equity, enterprises in non-pollution-intensive industries, and enterprises in highly marketized regions. CER performance can be better enhanced by the clustering of state-owned, local, and foreign bank branches around enterprises. In addition, the entry and exit of bank branches can improve CER performance as it can foster the effective allocation of financial resources, and this effect is more evident for private enterprises. To conclude, this study has evaluated the value of bank branch evolution for the environment and society of emerging countries.

China’s Pilot Free Trade Zones and Company’s Sustainability Performance

This paper investigates the role of pilot free trade zones (FTZs) as a policy testing terrace for achieving the sustainable development goals in China. Using a sample of data from Chinese companies that were listed in Shanghai and Shenzhen A stocks, from 2009 to 2021, a difference-in-difference model is employed to assess the impact of FTZ establishment on sustainable development. The findings indicate that establishing FTZs significantly enhances a company’s sustainability performance, particularly in terms of environmental and social responsibility performance. They also foster an innovation-friendly environment, facilitating sustainable development goals in both institutional and innovation domains. Furthermore, the policy effects of FTZs exhibit a mixed picture, involving both a curse effect of political resources and a reinforcement effect of environmental protection goals. Additionally, the Matthew effect and spillover effect are observed in FTZs. Finally, this paper explores the linkages between FTZ construction and China’s “dual circulation” development pattern, revealing the effective role of FTZs in conjunction with new energy model cities for enhancing sustainable development. However, the linkage between FTZs and the Belt and Road Initiative is currently limited in terms of positively impacting a company’s sustainability performance.

Digital transformation and manufacturing companies’ ESG responsibility performance

Digital transformation improves the efficiency and perception of companies. This paper investigates the impact of digital transformation in improving the environmental, social, and governance (ESG) responsibility performance of manufacturing companies in China. The results show that digital transformation can significantly improve manufacturing companies’ ESG responsibility performance. Every 1% increase in the degree of digital transformation will improve the ESG responsibility performance of manufacturing companies by 0.124%. Among the digital transformation techniques, digital strategy plays a more significant role than digital technology in improving manufacturing companies’ ESG responsibility performance. Total factor productivity, information transparency and investor stickiness moderate how digital transformation affects manufacturing companies’ ESG responsibility performance. The findings of this paper enrich and expand the research on the effects of digital transformation on manufacturing companies and provide a novel perspective to accelerate the progress of manufacturing companies worldwide in fulfilling ESG responsibilities and achieving global carbon emission reduction targets.

The contagion effect of corporate environmental responsibility in megaprojects: Analyzing underlying processes

The corporate environmental responsibility (CER) performance of contractors is a critical antecedence for the sustainable construction and operation of megaprojects. Studies have confirmed that individual or organizational traits, as well as the external institutional environment, influence contractors' CER decisions and behaviors. However, researchers have neglected the crucial fact that in a megaproject organization, other contractors' environmental responsibility practices also may affect the environmental responsibility decisions of the focal contractor, which refer to as the “contagion effect of CER in megaprojects”. This study examined the authenticity of this contagion effect and develops a conceptual framework to reveal the contagion process. Using 249 survey data from contractor managers with megaproject construction experience, the results confirm the contagion effect of CER in megaprojects. The detailed contagion process is that the focal contractor employees' organizational pride and social capital perception are activated by other contractors' CER practices, thereby choosing to follow other contractors to adopt similar CER strategies. Meanwhile, this process is partially moderated by contractors' megaproject identification. Specifically, contractors with a high level of megaproject identification will have greater organizational pride when observing other contractors' CER practices. However, megaproject identification does not change contractors' social capital perception level. This study provides valuable insights into understanding the contagion process of CER among contractors in megaprojects, and the related findings can help owners effectively incentive contractors' CER intentions to achieve higher megaproject sustainability performance.

Nudging corporate environmental responsibility through green finance? Quasi-natural experimental evidence from China

Green finance has drawn increased worldwide attention from policymakers as a financial mechanism that could potentially encourage corporations to actively engage in sustainable activities. However, despite a growing body of studies investigating the economic outcomes of green financial policies, there is still a lack of research that systematically quantifies the social welfare implications of green finance. Hence, this study aims to fill this research gap by establishing the causal effect of green finance on corporate environmental responsibility. Exploiting the “bottom-up” enforcement of the green finance pilots in 2017 in China as a quasi-natural experiment and the difference-in-difference-in-difference identification strategy, we find that green finance significantly enhances corporate environmental responsibility performance in high-polluting industries relative to their counterparts, and this evidence continues to survive a battery of robustness checks. Moreover, we explore three underlying mechanisms that possibly explain this beneficial effect: risk-taking, external governance and financing channels. Furthermore, we uncover that corporate environmental responsibility serves as a plausible non-economic channel that combines green finance with economic benefits by stimulating green innovation, promoting total factor productivity and expanding market share. Overall, our study offers new insights on both the economic and non-economic consequences of green finance on business performance.

Corporate Environmental Protection Behavior and Sustainable Development: The Moderating Role of Green Investors and Green Executive Cognition

Faced with serious environmental problems, companies have become important participants in environmental protection efforts. By assuming environmental responsibilities and pursuing environmental protection, enterprises can create a good image, gain public and government support, and expand their influence. Simultaneously, green executive cognition and green investors play important roles in enterprises and the market economy. This study examines whether the environmental protection behavior of enterprises has a positive impact on their sustainable development, and how green investors and green executive cognition affect the relationship between environmental protection and sustainable development. This study adopts a fixed effects regression method to research Chinese A-share listed companies in 2011-2020. The results show that enterprises' performance regarding environmental responsibilities or investment promotes sustainable development. The higher the participation of green investors or the higher the awareness of green executives, the more the environmental responsibility performance and environmental investment promote enterprises' sustainable development. This study enriches the literature on the environmental protection behavior of enterprises and the sustainable development of enterprises as well as provides a theoretical foundation for related research. Moreover, the role of green investors and green executive cognition in promoting environmental protection and the sustainable development of enterprises will inspire investors and executives.

Corporate social responsibility performance among listed non-financial firms in Nigeria

The extent of involvement in Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) by companies in Nigeria is required in order to know the level of acceptance and actual performance of CSR demands on the companies. This descriptive research design study was carried out using data from the annual reports (2010-2019) of listed non-financial companies in Nigeria. Social and environmental disclosures based on the Global Reporting Initiative framework (GRI-4) were used. Social disclosure is measured as an index score generated from the score of 1 or 0 for disclosures or otherwise on community, donation, employee, health and safety, and customer/complaints. Environmental disclosure represents an index score generated from the score of 1 or 0 for disclosures or otherwise on material, energy, water, biodiversity, emission/greenhouse gas, waste management, product services, and compliance with laws. The companies are involved in activities that contribute more to social sustainability than environmental sustainability, accounting for an aggregate average performance score of 0.71 (71%) and 0.03 (3%) for social and environmental responsibility respectively. The firms contributed significantly to social responsibility and very little with no significant performance in environmental responsibility. The very low environmental responsibility performance among these firms is worrisome and calls for investigation into the existing national environmental regulatory frameworks.

The impact of management’s characteristics on corporate environmental responsibility performance of energy systems in the digital age—Evidence from China’s traditional energy listed companies industry

China is promoting green economic development and the transformation of polluting enterprises to environment-friendly. As an important polluting industry, energy companies are imminent to improve their corporate environmental responsibility performance(CERP). However, corporate strategic decisions are made by the senior management team and market environment such as the digital economy also play a crucial role. In order to study the relationship between management’s characteristics and CERP and the role of the digital economy, this paper selects 2010–2019 listed companies in the traditional energy industry in A-shares as the research object, and conducts an empirical analysis on the characteristics of their managers and the CERP. The results show that during the Thirteenth Five-Year Plan period, in the stage of rapid development of the digital economy, CERP is significantly improved, the gender diversity and educational background of managers have a significant positive impact on the CERP, and the age is negatively related to the CERP. From this point of view, it is suggested that companies should promote young management, increase the proportion of female management, and give priority to those with higher education.

Impact of green credit policy on sustainability performance of high-pollution enterprises.

Green credit is a financial service that potentially mitigates the impact of environment problems such as climate change, one of the greatest challenges of our time. The effectiveness of a policy that promotes green credit, however, remains controversial. We use China's "Green Credit Guidelines" in 2012 as a quasi-natural experiment to identify the causal impact of green credit policy (GCP) on enterprise sustainability performance (ESP), which integrates the financial and environmental social responsibility performance of heavily polluting firms. Our PSM-DID analysis shows that GCP significantly improves ESP, especially among the small and private highly polluting firms and firms located in regions with a higher level of marketization. Furthermore, GCP leads to more green innovation which, together with government subsidies, plays a positive moderating role between GCP and ESP. Our results have important policy implications.

Green finance and corporate environmental responsibility: evidence from heavily polluting listed enterprises in China.

Green finance is not just a global trend, but it has become an important channel for industrialized countries to achieve sustainable growth. However, few studies have discussed the environmental governance effects of green finance from the micro-firm level. Based on the data of Chinese A-share listed firms in heavily polluting industries, we, combining with property rights and environmental regulation, empirically research the influence of green finance on corporate environmental responsibility (CER) performance. Results indicate that green finance has a significant negative effect on the environmental responsibility of heavily polluting firms. The result remains after a series of robustness tests. In addition, property rights and environmental regulation play a moderating role in the above relationship. The negative impact of green finance on CER is stronger in private firms and firms in areas with low environmental regulation intensity. Moreover, we observe that green finance decreases the CER performance of heavily polluting firms by increasing financing constraints, reducing environmental investment, and diminishing technological innovation. This study identifies the external factors that influence CER and also provides implications and theoretical support for the government to improve the setting and the implementation of green finance policy in the future.

Can environmental protection tax aggravate illegal pollution discharge of heavy polluting enterprises?

This paper mainly studies the impact of environmental protection tax (EPT) on the illegal emission behaviors of heavy polluting enterprises. Based on the real-time data from the nearest air monitoring points, this paper calculates the day-night difference of PM2.5 to measure whether there are illegal emission behaviors. And, difference in difference method (DID) is used based on the quasi-natural experiment of EPT. First, the baseline DID results show that EPT reduces day-night difference of PM2.5, and inhibits illegal emissions. Second, the influence paths results show that EPT can inhibit illegal emission by increasing innovation, environmental responsibility performance, and environmental penalty cost, and EPT aggravate illegal emissions by increasing environmental costs and environmental corruption. Third, the influence of different pollutant pricing on illegal emissions is further analyzed. The effect of air pollutant pricing on illegal emissions is inhibited first and then promoted, while higher water pollutant pricing will aggravate illegal emissions. This paper provides enlightenment on adjusting EPT policy for local governments to curb illegal emissions, and provides an economic explanation for the differences of illegal pollution discharge in different places.

Badania nad poprawą wyników małych i mikroprzedsiębiorstw poprzez stosowanie zielonych innowacji

It is an important goal of China’s 2025 Strategy to build an environmental governance system with the government as the leading role, enterprises as the main body, and social organizations and the public all participate actively. In this context, whether and how small and micro enterprises, as a force of rejuvenating the country through science and technology, participate in the construction of environmental governance system is discussed in this paper. This study uses the 12th China small and micro enterprise survey database to deeply analyze the direct and indirect effects between green innovation and small and micro enterprise performance, and finds that: in the direct effect analysis, the direct promotion effect of green innovation on the financial performance of small and micro enterprises is related to the development stage of small and micro enterprises, which is significant in the initial stage and mature stage, but not significant in the growth stage; in the indirect effect analysis, green innovation can indirectly improve the overall performance of small and micro enterprises by improving their environmental and social responsibility performance. At the same time, green innovation can amplify the role of other factors in promoting the overall performance. This study not only enriches the research scope of green innovation theory from the subdivision dimension, provides a new perspective for the integration of green innovation and social responsibility theory, it also provides theoretical reference and guidance for the green innovation practice of small and micro enterprises.

Anti-corruption and corporate environmental responsibility: Evidence from China’s anti-corruption campaign

Taking advantage of China’s vigorous anti-corruption campaign implemented in 2013, this study examines the impact of anti-corruption activities on the corporate environmental responsibility (CER) performance of listed Chinese enterprises from 2010 to 2016. The empirical analysis employs a Difference-in-Differences design to identify the causal effect by using the anti-corruption campaign as an exogenous policy shock. Results indicate that China’s unprecedented anti-corruption campaign launched in 2013 significantly improves the CER performance of high-corruption enterprises. Such an effect is most evident for state-owned enterprises, especially local government-owned ones and those in pollution-intensive industries. These results remain after a series of robustness tests. The mechanism results suggest that the promotion effects of the anti-corruption campaign on CER performance can be achieved through environmental regulations, corporate rent-seeking, and innovation behaviors. Moreover, anti-corruption improves the profitability of enterprises, but the effect is significantly offset by increased CER activities.

Differentiated environmental regulations and corporate environmental responsibility: The moderating role of institutional environment

Environmental regulations (ERs) manifest in three main types: command-and-control ER (CMCER), market-based ER (MBER) and informal public ER (IPER). This article analyzes the impact of each type of ER on corporate environmental responsibility (CER) performance, and investigates the moderating effects of firms’ institutional environment on the relationship between ERs and CER. Using data from Chinese listed companies between 2009 and 2016, we found that all three types of ERs are positively related to CER performance. Such effects are more pronounced in regions with high marketization, industries with fierce product market competition and in environmentally sensitive industries, but are weakened by regional economic growth pressures. The moderating effect of corporate ownership structure on the relationship between ERs and CER is diverse, in that the impact of CMCER on the CER of non-state-owned enterprises (non-SOEs) and state-owned enterprises (SOEs) is basically the same, but the impact of MBER and IPER on the CER of non-SOEs are significantly greater than that of SOEs. Further subdivision found that the impact of ERs on the CER of central SOEs is higher than that of local SOEs, and that political connections weaken the impact of ERs on the CER performance of non-SOEs. Using the mandatory disclosure policy as an instrumental variable, a Heckman two-stage model is used to overcome the endogeneity problem caused by self-selection bias. Robustness tests controlling for missing variable bias and the ordered probit/logit model further support our conclusions. Our research shows that the Chinese government should be committed to creating a supportive institutional environment to ensure the effectiveness of their ERs in pursuit of improved CER performance and sustainable development.