Research On The Peer Effects Of Environmental Behavior Of Chinese Listed Manufacturing Companies

With the rapid development of the industrial economy,environmental problems have become increasingly prominent.According to the 2022 Global Environmental Performance Index(EPI)Report,the score of China’s environmental performance is 38.4,ranking 160 th out of 180 countries in the world and decreasing from 2020.Faced with tremendous ecological and environmental pressure,the Chinese government has also raised the construction of ecological civilization to a strategic height,for example,in October 2022,the report of the 20 th CPC National Congress stressed the necessity of green development.As an important subject of the society,enterprises play a key role in economic development and social sustainability.At the same time,they are also the main source of pollution emission.Therefore,they should fulfill their environmental responsibilities and carry out environmental governance.Based on this,from the perspective of peer effect,this dissertation selects three typical corporate environmental behaviors as the research objects,namely green innovation,environmental management system certification and environmental information disclosure,and studies the existence,influencing factors,economic consequences,formation mechanism and heterogeneity of the peer effect of environmental behavior,which helps to deepen the understanding of the motivation behind corporate environmental behavior and provides theoretical guidance for promoting enterprises to adopt environmental behavior.Based on the panel data of Chinese manufacturing companies listed in Shanghai and Shenzhen A-shares from 2008 to 2020,firstly,this dissertation studies the peer effect of corporate green innovation.The results show that:(1)Corporate green innovation has the industry peer effect,that is,the average level of green innovation of other enterprises in the same industry will promote corporate green innovation,and such an effect remains significant after considering the interference of the peer effect in the same province;(2)Environmental regulation and media coverage will strengthen such effect while the Confucian culture has no impact;(3)The peer effect of green innovation has a negative impact on both financial and environmental performance,thus has a negative impact on sustainability performance;(4)The formation mechanism test shows that,the green innovation behavior of industry leaders and followers can be affected by each other,and the impact of leaders on followers is greater,that is,the peer effect of green innovation is more significant in follower enterprises,indicating that enterprises learn from peers to obtain information;(5)Heterogeneity analysis shows that,compared to non-state-owned enterprises,the peer effect of green innovation is more significant in state-owned enterprises.Secondly,this dissertation investigates the peer effect of corporate environmental management system certification.The results show that:(1)Corporate environmental management system certification has the industry peer effect,that is,the average level of environmental management system certification of other enterprises in the same industry will stimulate corporate environmental management system certification,and such an effect remains significant after considering the interference of the peer effect in the same province;(2)The Confucian culture will weaken such effect while environmental regulation and media coverage have no impact;(3)The peer effect of environmental management system certification has a negative impact on both financial and environmental performance,thus has a negative impact on sustainability performance;(4)The formation mechanism test shows that the higher the degree of industry competition,the greater the peer effect of corporate environmental management system certification,indicating that enterprises mainly imitate peers to maintain their competitive advantage.Thirdly,this dissertation explores the peer effect of corporate environmental information disclosure.The results show that:(1)Corporate environmental information disclosure has the industry peer effect,that is,the average level of environmental information disclosure of other enterprises in the same industry will improve corporate environmental information disclosure,and such an effect remains significant after considering the interference of the peer effect in the same province;(2)Environmental regulation,media coverage and Confucian culture will strengthen such effect;(3)The peer effect of environmental information disclosure has a negative impact on environmental performance while has no impact on financial performance;(4)The formation mechanism test shows that the higher the degree of industry competition,the greater the peer effect of environmental information disclosure,indicating that enterprises mainly imitate peers to maintain their competitive advantage;and the environmental information disclosure of industry leaders and followers can be affected by each other and there is no significant difference between them,indicating that leader–follower relation does not influence the peer effect of corporate environmental information disclosure;(5)Heterogeneity analysis shows that,compared to non-heavily polluting industries,the peer effect of corporate environmental information disclosure is more significant in heavily polluting industries.