Work

Is Public Participation Weak Environmental Regulation? Experience from China’s Environmental Public Interest Litigation Pilots

Year: 2024

Type: article

Abstract: Previous studies have generally concluded that public participation lacks substantive constraints and has weak environmental regulation effects. Using China’s environmental public interest litigation (EPIL), implemented in 2015, as a quasi-natural experiment to verify the environmental effects of public participation under judicial norms, the difference-in-differences (DID) estimates in this paper show that industrial wastewater and industrial sulfur dioxide (SO2) emissions in the treated cities declined by an average of 2.76 million tons and 2.51 kilotons per year, respectively, which ultimately improved the city’s environmental quality. The results of the mechanism also show that the EPIL was able to mobilize all three parties: the public, government and enterprises. In the context of the environment as an externality product, where the interests of all the parties are difficult to coordinate, the EPIL has the advantage of overcoming conflicts of interest. Our study provides a quantitative justification for the environmental impact assessment of public litigation and contributes empirical references to overcome the weak binding defect of public participatory environmental regulation.

Source: Sustainability

DOI: 10.3390/su16208883

Authors: Mengchan Zhao, Yangyang Cheng

Institutions: Chizhou University, Wuhan University

Language: English

Topic: Environmental law and policy

Subfield: Law

Field: Social Sciences

Domain: Social Sciences

SDGs: Peace, justice, and strong institutions, Clean water and sanitation, Responsible consumption and production

Open Access status: gold

Estimated APC paid: $2,728