Impact of contractual governance and guanxi on contractors’ environmental behaviors: The mediating role of trust

Improving the environmental behaviors of contractors is essential for ensuring the sustainable development of construction projects given the increasing environmental pressures on this industry. However, both contractual governance and guanxi, as the main governance tools, and their relationship to contractors' environmental behaviors remain a “black box” and controversial. Therefore, this study examines the influence of contractual governance and guanxi on contractors' environmental behaviors and the mediating role of trust. We conducted a multiple regression analysis and Bootstrapping mediation test on a sample of 258 valid questionnaires to verify our research hypotheses. The results reveal that contractual governance has a significantly positive impact on contractors’ environmental behaviors across three stages, while there is an inverted U-shaped relationship between guanxi and contractors’ environmental behaviors in the defensive stage. As guanxi increases and reaches a certain threshold, its effect on environmental behaviors in the defensive stage changes from promotion to inhibition, with a diminishing marginal return. Furthermore, trust not only directly promotes the environmental behaviors of contractors but also has a mediating effect on the relationship between contractual governance and environmental behaviors in the defensive stage and on the relationship between guanxi and environmental behaviors at all stages. This study contributes to the body of knowledge by delineating the path of project-level governance mechanisms on contractors’ environmental behaviors and provides insightful management suggestions to promote the environmental performance of construction projects.