Auditing the environmental accountability of local officials and the corporate green response: evidence from China

Auditing the natural-resource asset accountability of local officials is an institutional innovation that China used to transform its mode of economic development from that of an ‘industrial civilization’ to an ‘ecological civilization’. This study investigated the effect of changes in the assessment of local officials for promotion (i.e. including environmental protection in the assessment, along with economic performance) on the green response of enterprises. To this end, a nationwide pilot project (2015–2017) involving the auditing of natural-resource assets for local officials was used as a quasi-experiment. The results indicated that the green response level of the treatment (audit pilot) group was significantly higher than that of the control group. This indicated that the system for auditing the natural-resource assets for local officials had environmental governance effects. According to a mediation analysis, both governmental subsidies and bank credit mediated the effect of auditing on green response of enterprises. This indicates that during the pilot audits of natural-resource assets, high-polluting enterprises mainly met the requirements of the government and banks for a green response to obtain economic support. This study provides empirical evidence for evaluating policy effects and strengthening the audits of local officials’ environmental accountability.