Search

The policy of the national smart city (NSC) pilots, a new type of urbanization for future development, has been implemented in China in batches. This paper investigates the mechanism and effects of the NSC pilots on the environment. Using the prefecture-level panel data during 2004-2018 period, our dynamic difference-in-differences (DID) estimation shows that the NSC pilots causally mitigate air (water) pollution by 21.5% (23.3%). The mediating effect model indicates that the allocation efficiency and technological innovation play a partial mediating role in the impacting mechanism. After introducing the two mediating channels into the dynamic DID model, the reduction effect for air (water) pollution drops to 15.5% (17.3%). Comparatively, improving allocation efficiency instead of technological innovation takes the major mediating role in reducing air pollution, while water pollution the opposite. The result of city heterogeneity shows that cities with high human capital and fiscal support contribute to the reduction of environmental pollution. This study also provides some related policy suggestions by analyzing the initial mechanism and city heterogeneity of the NSC pilots.

Exploiting Chongqing's promotion to a province-level municipality, this paper investigates the causal effect of political hierarchy on corporate SO2 emissions using a spatial regression discontinuity (RD) design. In 1997, the prefecture-level Chongqing was promoted to a province-level municipality, obtaining a substantial increase in decision-making power over fiscal, personnel and administrative affairs. Given the fact that the areas around the Chongqing-Sichuan border shared the same social, economic, and geographical conditions prior to the treatment, the novel findings show that political hierarchy negatively affects corporate SO2 emissions and Chongqing's enterprises adjacent to the border have a 26% (1-e−0.301) reduction of SO2 emissions comparatively. The effects are robust enough using alternative model specifications and bandwidths. Besides, this paper provides empirical evidence that enterprises of Chongqing have resource-receiving and external-financing advantages owing to its higher political status. These interwoven advantages help enterprises in Chongqing exhibit better financial performance and enable them to conduct energy substitution, improve energy efficiency and adopt more end-of-pipe treatment, thereby mitigating SO2 emissions. Based on these findings, this study provides policy implications by shedding light on the effects of political hierarchy on corporate pollution emissions.