Performance-based or politic-related decomposition of environmental targets: A multilevel analysis in China

Abstract

China relies on the total pollutant emission control and environmental target responsibility system to curb environmental pollution and improve energy conversation. How the central government breaks down environmental targets among provincial governments lies at the core, but little research has been done to explore the determinants of environmental target-setting empirically. This work models the decomposition process of environmental targets by focusing on the roles of historical performance and provinces' political status. With the method of hierarchical linear model, data on five kinds of environmental obligatory targets (energy consumption per unit GDP and other four kinds of pollutants) during China's "12th Five-year Plan" period is used to test the hypotheses. The results show that provincial historical structural performance is negatively significantly correlated with their environmental target levels, while the effects of historical scale performance and intensity performance are not significant. Besides, provinces with higher political rankings tend to be allocated higher targets, which is in accordance with the model effect hypothesis rather than the bargaining effect hypothesis.