Differentiated environmental regulations and enterprise innovation: the moderating role of government subsidies and executive political experience

Environmental protection is receiving more and more attention in China. Chinese government and society have implemented well-designed environmental regulations (ERs). While ERs have economic and environmental implications, whether they favor or stifle technological innovation is uncertain and shows paradoxical tension between different viewpoints. To reconcile it, this paper distinguishes three types of environmental regulations: Command-and-control environmental regulation (CER), market-based environmental regulation (MER), and Public-participation environmental regulation (PER). With data from Chinese A-share listed companies from 2008 to 2017, this study finds that CER and PER favor enterprise innovation, while MER does the opposite. Further analysis suggests that government subsidies positively moderate the influence of MER and PER on enterprise innovation. However, executive political experience negatively moderates the impact of three types of ERs on enterprise innovation. The heterogeneity analysis suggests that ERs' influence varies among enterprises with different life cycles and ownership, and in different regions and industries.