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In China, there exists a huge debate for a long time on whether a double dividend, reducing pollution emissions and boosting employment, can be achieved by intensifying environmental regulations. In this paper, we use two data sets on provincial environmental legislation and Chinese manufacturing firms during 1998–2013, to estimate the impact of provincial environmental legislation on the firms' employment growth with a difference-in-difference (DID) model. Results showed that (1) after the implementation of environmental legislation, the employment growth of regulated manufacturing firms decreases significantly by 3.07%, and this result is robust to alternative tests. (2) Local environmental legislation reduces employment growth mainly via the influencing mechanism of the firm's entry and exit, export, and innovation. (3) The local environmental legislation has heterogeneous impacts on employment growth in different industries and different regions, and the estimated effect is more obvious in high-pollution industries and areas with strong enforcement. (4) Environmental legislation significantly improves job destruction and reduces job creation, resulting in a − 3.86% job net increase. Due to the long-term implementation of extensive economic growth mode, China's ecological environment has been deteriorating since the 1990s, and environmental pollution has attracted more and more social attention. Until 2013, the Communist Party of China put forward 'ecological civilization', and building a beautiful new China with harmonious coexistence between man and nature has become an important development strategy. Meanwhile, starting from the implementation of the Two-Control-Zone policy in 1998, China has implemented numerous environmental policies in just ten years. These environmental policies have greatly improved the quality of China's ecological environment, but their economic effects have been controversial. Given the special historical period, this paper helps assess the impact of Chinese environmental policies on employment and provides a more objective policy evaluation and implications for improving existing laws and regulations to achieve higher social welfare. To achieve this goal of balancing the improvement of the ecological environment and high employment level, environmental policies firstly should be flexible to ensure that the environmental standards follow the firm's characteristics and regional characteristics to avoid "one size fits all". Particularly, for regions with poor economic development or having a single industrial structure, the implementation cycle of the environmental policies should be extended to ensure that they have enough time to achieve industrial restructuring and complete the environmental protection goals. Secondly, we find that environmental legislation hurts employment growth by limiting export decisions, so the government should use multiple channels to stabilize export when implementing environmental legislation. Thirdly, technological R&D and innovation play an important role in the effect of environmental legislation on firms' employment growth. Therefore, the government should provide a more flexible environment for firms' R&D and innovation with appropriate fiscal policies and technical support. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The pilot of Accountability Audit of Natural resources (AANR) is an important initiative for the Communist Party of China Central Committee to eradicate environmental pollution and promote the construction of ecological civilization. The purpose of this study is to explore the relationship between AANR and green innovation in heavily polluting enterprises, so as to promote regional sustainable development. With a sample of the national key monitoring enterprises in China from 2011 to 2018, this paper investigates the impact of AANR on green innovation in heavily polluting enterprises by applying the multi-period difference-in-differences model. The results indicate that AANR significantly promotes green innovation in heavily polluting enterprises. The results of mechanism testing indicate that AANR stimulates green innovation by promoting government environmental governance and government innovation-driven strategy. The heterogeneity testings indicate that the promoting effect of AANR on green innovation in heavily polluting enterprises is more significant in regions with higher environmental carrying capacity, higher pressure of GDP achievement and higher transparency of government environmental information. Therefore, China should deepen the enforcement of AANR to promote the green transformation of heavily polluting enterprises. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China has been the socialist country since 1949, when the new country was established. Communist Party of China (CPC) selected Marxism as the governing ideology for China which is consistent with the hierarchical and centre government system. CPC is dedicated to improving happiness of society for the citizens within the framework of Marxism ideology. However, the concept of Marxism happiness, and its development are still limited in terms of understanding and study. This paper explored the development of concept of Marxism happiness through the different works of Marx from his early writing to the authoritative academic book. The researcher then defined the concept of Marxism Happiness. This paper employs document analysis and thematic analysis to provide a clear understanding of the concept of Marxism Happiness and its implication for the happiness of Chinese citizens, meanwhile, it would be conducive to the researchers and policy makers in ideological construction of a country. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Communist Party of China's 19th National Congress underlined the necessity of speeding the development of a manufacturing powerhouse and advanced manufacturing sector by supporting the deep integration of the Internet, big data, artificial intelligence, and the real economy. This study employed principal component analysis to extract the prominent risk factors from questionnaire data in order to manage the risks connected with the Internet strategic transformation of manufacturing firms. To confirm the major risk factors, a structural equation modeling was created using Amos-24 software. The findings revealed that risk factors of Internet strategic transformation in manufacturing businesses are mostly expressed in equipment flexibility risks, organizational versatility risks, smart technology risks, Internet technology risks, flexible management risks, and financing management risks. The paper offers useful theoretical and practical insights into the risks of China's manufacturing businesses' Internet strategic transformation. The findings can assist manufacturing firms in better identifying and managing these risks, supporting their smooth transition to the Internet economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Crises constitute ideal opportunities for authoritarian leaders to promote certain narratives, shaping reality in their favor and crafting their own preferred storylines about current events. In other words: they serve authoritarian leaders on a silver platter the opportunity to instrumentalize these unforeseen circumstances to gain domestic political legitimacy by promoting strategic narratives. The COVID-19 pandemic was no exception in this regard. Ever since its onset in early 2020, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was among the most active actors worldwide seeking to capitalize on the global crisis for legitimation purposes. Whether applying narratives of governance supremacy, portraying the People's Republic of China as a "global savior," or promoting emotionally appealing nationalistic narratives, the regime used the pandemic as a window of opportunity to rebrand its international role and enhance its domestic legitimacy. When observing the CCP's communication style over the course of 24 pandemic months (2020–2022), however, major shifts become apparent regarding the main narratives crafted in communication with national audiences. Based on this, the paper focuses on the role of such narratives for legitimation claims. Using exemplary media articles collected between the outbreak of the pandemic in China in late 2019 until the harsh Shanghai lockdown in spring 2022, it thus traces the narratives employed by Chinese state elites and explores how they are intertwined with nationalism and broader power claims. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The report to the 20th National Congress of the Communist Party of China mentioned that China is facing tightening resource and environmental constraints, environmental pollution, and other issues, and the energy-consuming right trading policy is a key measure to promote green, circular, and low-carbon development in China. Under the dual consideration of ecological benefits and economic benefits, this paper took the pilot launch of energy-consuming trading as a quasi-natural experiment and used panel data from 31 provinces in China from 2009 to 2020 and the different-in-differences method to explore the impact of this policy on the optimization and upgrading of China's industrial structure. The study showed that: (J) The energy-consuming right trading policy could promote the optimization and upgrading of the industrial structure, and the promotion effect on the upgrading of the industrial structure outweighed its adverse impact on the rationalization of the industrial structure, as evidenced by a series of robustness tests. © The mechanism analysis showed that the realization paths of industrial structure upgrading were the upgrading of technological innovation and that of energy consumption structure, and the policy suppressed the adverse impact on the rationalization of industrial structure by improving the input structure and output structure of some industrial sectors. © In addition, the pilot policy of energy-consuming rights had obvious regional heterogeneity for the optimization and upgrading of industrial structure, which significantly promoted the upgrading of industrial structure in the central and western regions and the rationalization of industrial structure in the eastern regions. This study provides some policy references for the optimization and upgrading of industrial structure from the perspective of improving the energy-consuming right trading market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the context of global low-carbon emission reduction, how to achieve green and high-quality development has become a major issue for the Communist Party of China (CPC) and the Chinese government recently. Based on the data of China's listed companies from 2013 to 2020, this paper uses Python to implement text analysis of annual reports, and explores the relationship between political acuity and carbon-efficiency synergies (CES) from the perspective of enterprise initiative. We found that (1) political acuity positively affects carbon-efficiency synergies. (2) Increased political acuity can reduce carbon emissions, but the effect on economic efficiency is not obvious. That is, low carbon takes the lead in raising the level of carbon-efficiency synergies. (3) Environmental regulations can positively regulate the relationship between political acuity and carbon-efficiency synergies. (4) Political acuity in southern China, carbon neutral and non-state-owned enterprises (NSOEs) will have a more pronounced effect on carbon-efficiency synergies. From the perspective of the root causes of political linkages, we find the synergies between formal and informal institutions, and the key factors for policy implementation. This paper is helpful for enterprises to improve the synergies of emission reduction and efficiency promotion, and has practical implications for the government to promote green and high-quality development. • Assess the value of the low-carbon economy from its political roots. • We build a carbon-efficiency synergy evaluation system. • Political acuity and formal institutions are synergistic. • The influence of political acuity on CES can be replicated. • This paper expands the technical approach to low-carbon research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The relationship between government and enterprise has attracted extensive attention. Under the increasingly severe requirement of sustainable development, there is still a lack of research on the economic effect of political acuity from the perspective of enterprise's positive party value creation. We built a dictionary of political acuity and demonstrated reliability through machine learning algorithms such as K-Nearest Neighbor (KNN). Then, based on the annual reports of China's listed companies from 2013 to 2020, the relationship between political acuity, ESG atmosphere, and corporate performance is empirically discussed. Examination through the formal institutional perspective of informal institutionalization shows that the positive acuity of the Communist Party of China(CPC) and the democratic parties(DPC) will improve corporate performance, while the negative acuity will have an early warning effect on performance. Furthermore, the stronger ESG atmosphere synergized this relationship. The CPC's negative acuity has supervision effect on non-state-owned companies, and this supervisory effect still exists in the ESG atmosphere. However, whether the moderating effect is considered or not, the positive political acuity of state-owned enterprises doesn't significantly improve performance. We found that the CPC's embedding in corporate governance will lead to both economic and political benefits, and have thresholds. We constructed a political acuity dictionary and introduced text analysis and nonparametric estimation method in this paper, which provided a basis and reference for future research on political acuity at the enterprise level. Our findings also enrich the institutional theory and the embeddedness theory. Meanwhile, our research broadened the boundary of political parties, ESG, and enterprises, the integration of ideological values and formal institutions, and had practical implications for the green transformation of firms and the precise positioning of political party functions. • We build a dictionary of political acuity for the first time. This dictionary provides a new measurement perspective for the study of corporate political sentiment and sustainable development. • From the perspective of positive value creation, we examine the impact path of a company's party acuity, ESG atmosphere, and financial performance. This paper helps to expand the governance boundaries of ideology and formal institutions, political concepts, and corporate behavior. • We explored the accounting consequences of political acuity for different types of firms, and measured the economic and political effects thresholds. • We introduced machine learning, python crawler, text analysis, and nonparametric estimation methods into this paper, which helped to expand the technical approach to corporate governance and green transformation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China's 2018 constitutional adoption of the National Supervision Commission marked a watershed in the country's supervision system and anti-corruption work. This article seeks to investigate the power dynamics between the state machinery and the Chinese Communist Party as the newly supervisory power has come into being. It delves into the National Supervision Commission's origins, mandate, structure, and potential impacts on China's political sphere. It suggests that the emergence of the National Supervision Commission is a testament to the consolidation of the Chinese Communist Party control, potentially contradicting earlier attempts to separate party and state functions. This institutional novelty represents a paradigm change. The article proposes a nuanced understanding of the National Supervision Commission, considering both its potential to strengthen party authority and its bifurcated relationship with other state bodies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In August 2019, The Shenzhen Model City Initiative was released in which the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) announced its decision to support Shenzhen, the long-standing poster city for China's economic reform, in building a demonstration pilot zone for Chinese socialism with a particular emphasis on further developing the city's technological prowess. What are the ideological implications of the latest model-making of Shenzhen? And how does the city's innovative turn relate to its role as the nation's perceived civilizational front line? This study explores the continuities and evolution of contemporary Chinese governance by considering the reinvention of the "Shenzhen Model" in relation to processes of urbanization, globalization and industrial upgrading. Drawing upon Tim Oakes's theory of the "urban" as an ideological device, it examines the (re)making of the "Shenzhen Model" through different discourses, apparatuses and policies related to the city's technological innovation and entrepreneurship. Situating the "Shenzhen Model" at a time of precarity and uncertainty amidst economic growth slowdown, the China-United States trade war and the COVID-19 pandemic, this article demonstrates how the state mobilizes narratives and practices pertinent to technological innovation and entrepreneurship to enhance its political influence and thus sheds light on the latest developments in urban governance during China's post-industrial turn. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of China Quarterly is the property of Cambridge University Press and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This study examines the parental socio-cultural and political effects on parenting practices in China. Based on the China Education Panel Survey, we construct a new typology of parenting styles – intensive, permissive, authoritarian and neglectful – and focus on intensive parenting as a particular mode in which the more privileged families in China use superior cultural and political resources to reinforce their advantages. We show that parents in higher class positions, with higher education and with membership in the leading Chinese Communist Party (CCP) tend to adopt intensive parenting as a means of securing all-round development and obtaining favourable academic achievement for their children. Parenting styles thus reflect a more complicated feature of social stratification in China than in Western societies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 1950s witnessed high accident rates in China’s industrial workplaces. Previous scholarship has attributed this phenomenon to enterprises prioritizing production over safety and to the impotence of China’s labor unions in enforcing safety policies. This article proposes a third approach by exploring the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) mass-based safe production regime, which was designed for political struggle against capitalists as well as fulfilling its political commitments to workers, while also aiming to enhance safety. Consequently, China’s labor authorities often adopted a principle of absolving workers from accident responsibilities, often shifting blame to enterprise leaders. This approach was ineffective in preventing accidents. In addition, the party’s safety education policies fell short because they romanticized older workers as safety-conscious mentors to the younger workforce but overlooked the reality that these veterans were often more prone to accidents. The generational gap in China’s workforce also impeded the dissemination of safety knowledge and practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In autocratic regimes, democracy stands as a paradoxical beacon, feared and manipulated by dictators. This study examines China's conceptualisation of democracy post-Communist Party ascendancy, analysing key political historical milestones—the demise of the Qing dynasty, the Mao Era and subsequent leaders up to Xi Jinping today. The research sheds light on the Chinese Communist Party's customisation of democracy, guided by the writings of its leaders, to suit China's unique conditions. Democracy is an abstract concept, yet in China, authoritarian rule, hierarchical social structures and traditional values have helped shape interpretations and application. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study proposed a cutting-edge, multistep workflow and upgraded it by addressing its flaw of not considering how to determine the index system objectively. It then used the updated workflow to identify the probability of China's systemic financial crisis and analyzed the impact of macroeconomic indicators on the crisis. The final workflow comprises four steps: selecting rational indicators, modeling using supervised learning, decomposing the model's internal function, and conducting the non-linear, non-parametric statistical inference, with advantages of objective index selection, accurate prediction, and high model transparency. In addition, since China's international influence is progressively increasing, and the report of the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China has demonstrated that China is facing severe risk control challenges and stressed that the government should ensure that no systemic risks would emerge, this study selected China's systemic financial crisis as an example. Specifically, one global trade factor and 11 country-level macroeconomic indicators were selected to conduct the machine learning models. The prediction models captured six risk-rising periods in China's financial system from 1990 to 2020, which is consistent with reality. The interpretation techniques show the non-linearities of risk drivers, expressed as threshold and interval effects. Furthermore, Shapley regression validates the alignment of the indicators. The final workflow is suitable for categorical and regression analyses in several areas. These methods can also be used independently or in combination, depending on the research requirements. Researchers can switch to other suitable shallow machine learning models or deep neural networks for modeling. The results regarding crises could provide specific references for bank regulators and policymakers to develop critical measures to maintain macroeconomic and financial stability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of China Quarterly is the property of Cambridge University Press and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The attitude of the Chinese government towards social organizations (SOs) is crucial, as it affects the management rule and development tendency of SOs. To research the rule of SOs' participation in social governance in China, this study used a new historical perspective, the institutional development perspective, to conduct its exploration. This perspective provides an accurate measure of the reality of the SOs' participation, as it involves a mixed research methodology using continuous data from 73 years of reports and content mining, as well as topic clustering analysis to reveal a macroscopic and multi-line picture. Using a co-word analysis of hundreds of reports, from 1949–2021, in the People's Daily, an official newspaper of the Communist Party of China, this study quantified changes in intensity, emotion, and content regarding social organization participation in social governance through topic distribution. Three trends were revealed: (1) "social-oriented character" and "organized-oriented character" were identified during the change in SOs; (2) the extent of being managed gradually strengthened and shifted from the Communist Youth League of China to the Community Party of China; (3) the goals of SOs shifted from general to innovated function in special charitable organizations. The institutional development perspective can complement the focus event perspective, including a new method, co-word analysis, to examine official Chinese media and validate the Administrative Absorption of Society (AAS) theory by identifying two lines of topic clustering trends. The attention distribution analysis in official media from an institutional development perspective can help explore the role of official media reports in analyzing the allocation of national attention and provide new analytical methods for big data mining to establish the social and organizational natures of SOs to optimize their roles. It offers a basis for modern social governance policy innovation in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]