Does Collective Decision-Making Promote SOEs' Green Innovation? Evidence from China.

Green development is the main theme of today's economic and social development. Given the principle of "a promising government and an effective market", how to promote the green development of state-owned enterprises (SOEs) through government regulations is a scientific problem to be solved urgently. Leveraging the quasinatural experiment of the Opinions on Further Promoting the Implementation of the "Three Importances and One Greatness" Decision-making System in SOEs by the General Office of the CPC Central Committee and the General Office of the State Council in 2010 in China, we examine the impact of the "Three Importances and One Greatness" system on SOEs' green innovation and its mechanism. The results show that the enforcement of this system significantly improves the green innovation level of SOEs. Specifically, the green innovation level of SOEs increased by 23.98% on average after the implementation of the system, which is equivalent to an average increase of 1.271 in green patents granted. Moreover, the mechanism test results show that the effect of "Three Importances and One Greatness" on the green innovation level of SOEs occurs by inhibiting management myopia and increasing enterprises' green investments. Furthermore, the impact of the collective decision-making system on the level of green innovation is more pronounced among firms separated by their large scale and high media attention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]