Corporate Environmental Performance in China: The Moderating Effects of the Media versus the Approach of Local Governments

Abstract

This article selects the listed companies in China’s A-share heavy pollution industry from 2014 to 2018 as samples, uses a random effect model to empirically test the relationship between media attention and corporate environmental performance and examines the impacts of local government environmental protection and property nature on that relationship. Results are as follow: (1) Media attention can significantly affect a company’s environmental performance. The higher the media attention, the greater the company’s supervision and the better its environmental performance. (2) In areas where the government pays less attention to environmental protection, the impact of media on corporate environmental performance is more obvious, but in other areas, the impact of media on environmental performance cannot be reflected; (3) The media attention is very significant for the environmental performance improvement of state-owned enterprises, and it is not obvious in non-state-owned enterprises. (4) A further breakdown of the study found that the role of media attention in corporate environmental performance is only significant in the sample of local governments that have low environmental protection and are state-owned enterprises. This research incorporates the local government’s emphasis on environmental protection into the research field of vision, expands the research scope of media and corporate environmental performance, and also provides new clues and evidence for promoting the active fulfillment of environmental protection responsibilities by companies and local governments.

Green Human Resource Management: The Path to Corporate Environmental Performance

“…Upon a critical look at the literature reviewed, it was established that GHRM activities such as green recruitment, selection, training, development, and compensation, among others indicated (see figure 2) influence corporate environmental performance. This outcome shown is in tandem with the outcome emanating from (Ahmad, 2015b;Guo & Lu, 2020;Roscoe et al, 2019b;Singh et al, 2020b). The more employees become conscious of the green practices and policies initiated by their organization, the more they are likely to be committed to partaking in green activities to promote corporate environmental performance (Roscoe et al, 2019b;Singh et al, 2020b).…”

“…Moreover, the introduction of many laws regarding the environment by countries the market, and some internationally recognized bodies have awoken business entities and managements to pursue environmental performance (Chaklader & Gulati, 2015). Reflecting on what has been stated, it is believed that the availability of corporate environmental performance provides an avenue to elevate the competitiveness of entities and establishes a win-win situation (Guo & Lu, 2020). This is because the pursuit of greening which centers on corporate environmental performance has become a competitive strategy for organizations (Marhatta & Adhikari, 2013).…”

“…The quest to ensure effective environmental performance initiatives improves organizational practices, minimizes operational cost, enhances the corporate image, enhances competitiveness, and complies with rules and regulations relative to the protection of the environment (Chaklader & Gulati, 2015;DiPietro et al, 2013;Rodríguez-Antón et al, 2012). The pursuit of environmental performance is now regarded as the fulfillment of an organization's corporate social responsibility that ensures they thrive (Guo & Lu, 2020). Several practitioners and researchers evaluate companies' reactions to issues in the environment and this quest to integrate environmental performance activities into their strategic documents (Jabbour et al, 2010).…”

“…The rationale behind educating workers is to develop their green abilities, motivate them, and allow them to contribute to minimizing waste generated and other harmful substances (Chaklader & Gulati, 2015). More so, it is a means of activating their emotions to engage in a lot of creative means aimed at improving a firm's environmental performance (Guo & Lu, 2020;Marhatta & Adhikari, 2013).…”

“…Even though employees are inspired to do less harm to the environment, their attitude and commitment could be further deepened through compensation packages or remuneration systems (Guo & Lu, 2020;Shafaei et al, 2020). According to Shen et al, (2019), the presence of juicy compensation has a direct bearing on corporate environmental performance.…”