Campaign-style governance of air pollution in China? A comprehensive analysis of the central environmental protection inspection

Role of short-term campaigns and long-term mechanisms for air pollution control: lessons learned from the "2 + 26" city cluster in China

Protecting people from air pollution is an important task for developing countries. Over the past several decades, different types of policies have been enacted in developing countries to improve air quality, with policy impact analysis being conducted as well. As for China, while there is some existing literature on the impact of short-term action on air quality, there is much less research to investigate the roles of long-term air quality control mechanism on air quality change. This paper uses the "2 + 26" city cluster in China as a case study area to particularly analyze the roles played by short-term campaigns that compose the Winter Action Plan and a long-term mechanism referred to as the environmental accountability system in pollution control. Based on econometric and descriptive statistical analyses, it is found that the implementation of the Winter Action Plan has significantly improved the air quality, and the environmental accountability system seems to have exerted an impact, as cities with better air quality appear to establish a more stringent environmental accountability system. The paper provides the following insights for other developing countries: short-term campaigns can quickly reduce pollution and protect human health, while long-term mechanisms are needed to ensure sustainable environmental protection.

An evolutionary game study on the collaborative governance of environmental pollution: from the perspective of regulatory capture

Local governments have been captured by enterprises and, thus, have relaxed environmental regulations. This phenomenon has occurred repeatedly and has resulted in serious environmental pollution, posing an enormous threat to public health. To solve this problem, this study introduces central environmental protection inspection and media supervision and considers the economic preferences and environmental preferences of local governments. A four-party evolutionary game model composed of enterprises, local governments, the central government and the media is constructed, and the equilibrium solution of four-party replicator dynamics equations is obtained. The influence of relevant parameters on the choice of strategies of the four main bodies is simulated by using MATLAB software to explore the paths and measures for overcoming regulatory capture and to further improve the modern environmental governance system. The results show the following: First, local governments are easily captured by large enterprises. Second, the central government can improve the environmental behavior of local governments by reducing their economic preferences and strengthening punishment. Third, compared to the penalties imposed by the central government, those imposed by local governments have a more significant impact on the environmental behaviors of enterprises. Fourth, compared to the use of an environmental protection tax policy or a tax relief policy alone, the combination of the two has a more significant impact on the environmental behaviors of enterprises. Fifth, central environmental protection inspection and media supervision can improve the environmental behaviors of both local governments and enterprises, and the effect of media supervision is better than that of central environmental protection inspection. This study recommends improving the performance evaluation system for local governments to coordinate economic development and environmental protection, ensuring that local governments assume the main responsibility, using a combination of incentive and constraint policies for enterprises, and increasing the environmental protection inspection and media supervision of local governments and enterprises to resolve the dilemma of regulatory capture in environmental pollution through the simultaneous enhancement of the environmental behavior of local governments and enterprises.

The causal configurations of provincial health policy innovation in China: an analysis of the food safety standard filing policy

Introduction

According to China's Food Safety Law of 2015, the filing of food safety enterprise standards is a policy innovation led by p9rovincial governments in China. However, there are significant differences in the development of the "Food Safety Enterprise Standard Filing Policy" between provincial governments across the country. This study aims to explore the internal mechanisms driving autonomous innovation by provincial governments in the absence of administrative pressure from the central government, to better understand the policy innovation mechanism in the Chinese context.

Methods

Crispy Set Qualitative Comparative Analysis (csQCA) method is used to identify the innovation mechanism.

Results

This study found that provinces with good provincial economic resources and strong government capabilities are prone to policy innovation, and the influence of internal factors of provincial governments is stronger than that of external factors.

Discussion

When provincial economic resources and capacity are weak, endogenous factors in the province also help achieve proactive policy innovation by provincial governments. The research results reveal how provincial governments construct local policies in the absence of administrative pressure from the central government.