Corporate Green Technology Innovation Under Environmental Regulation:Substantive or Strategic?
The new environmental protection law(EPL),officially implemented on January 1,2015,aims to strengthen environmental protection efforts,enhance regulatory oversight,and enforce accountability,reflecting the government's commitment to promoting ecological civilization in response to increasingly severe environmental challenges.This paper treats the EPL as a quasi-natural experiment in environmental regulation,investigates whether the EPL fosters corporate green technology innovation,and examines its impact on both substantive and strategic green technology innovation.Using data from A-share listed companies in Shanghai and Shenzhen from 2011 to 2022,this paper adopts a difference-in-differences(DID)model to explore the effect and underlying mechanisms.The findings are as follows.First,the implementation of the EPL can elevate the overall level of corporate green technology innovation,primarily by promoting strategic green technology innovation.This conclusion is still valid after a series of robustness tests.Second,the EPL promotes overall corporate green technology innovation through three mechanisms:increasing environmental penalties for companies,mandating strict environmental information disclosure,and enhancing the environmental awareness of corporate managers.Third,financial constraints enhance the inhibitory effect of the EPL on substantive green technology innovation,whereas financial risks strengthen the promoting effect of the EPL on strategic green technology innovation.Fourth,the EPL has a more substantial promoting effect on strategic green technology innovation in enterprises with higher governance levels and larger enterprises.These findings provide relevant references for corporate green innovation in supporting China's ecological civilization construction and achieving carbon peaking and carbon neutrality goals.This paper makes marginal contributions as follows.First,by focusing on whether the EPL exerts heterogeneous effects on both substantive and strategic green technology innovation of enterprises,this paper presents an innovative research perspective,which facilitates a more accurate assessment of corporate investments and outcomes in the field of green technology.Second,the innovative theoretical framework offers a comprehensive perspective that integrates legal provisions,corporate behavior,and market responses,which helps to systematically analyze the mechanisms through which the EPL influences corporate green technology innovation.The findings can aid companies in effectively addressing challenges in their operations and flexibly adjusting their green technology innovation strategies to achieve sustainable long-term development.Third,this paper provides a robust analysis of the long-term effects of the EPL and addresses the issue of short sample time spans in existing research.Fourth,this paper investigates the heterogeneous impacts of the EPL on different types of enterprises,providing a basis for formulating more targeted environmental policies.
new environmental protection lawgreen technology innovationenvironmental penaltyenvironmental information disclosureenvironmental awareness
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