Understanding the nexus between environmental, social, and governance (ESG) and financial performance: evidence from Chinese-listed companies.

Before discussing how to balance and decide on environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG) and traditional revenue enhancement projects, it is crucial to clarify the relationship between corporate financial performance (CFP) and ESG. However, little attention has been paid to the nexus of ESG and CFP. This paper attempts firstly to investigate the bidirectional causality of ESG and CFP, followed by the micro-foundations, and finally, the moderating effect of intrinsic factors. A GMM-PVAR method was used to examine the research hypotheses, which can effectively deal with endogenous problems that have been ignored by traditional literature. The findings of this research demonstrate that CFP promoted ESG growth, but ESG did not boost CFP. This asymmetric causality was because CFP had a supportive effect on the environment and society pillars, while the social pillar cannot promote CFP, and the environment pillar negatively affects CFP. The relationship between ESG and CFP was moderated by total quality management, environmental sensitivity, and the pay gap. Furtherly, a panel threshold model was constructed to access the threshold effects of ESG on CFP, showing an inverted U-shape. Based on these findings, the theoretical implications, managerial prescriptions, and limitations are also discussed.

Does the construction of ecological civilization institution system promote the green innovation of enterprises? A quasi-natural experiment based on China's national ecological civilization pilot zones.

Enhancing green innovation is fundamental for constructing China's new ecological civilization era and participating in the global green industrial revolution. Therefore, it is necessary to improve the green innovation of the enterprises by enhancing the ecological civilization institution system. This study assesses the impact of China's ecological civilization institution system on green innovation, taking the establishment of the National Ecological Civilization Pilot Zone (NECPZ) as a quasi-natural experiment and the non-financial listed firms in China's A-share market from 2010 to 2019 as the research objects. A time-varying difference-in-differences approach is adopted to evaluate the effectiveness of the pilot policy. It is found that the pilot policy has promoted green innovation in the treatment group. The results are proven valid after a series of robustness tests. Heterogeneous impacts of the ownership and industry are also discussed, finding a more substantial effect on the non-state-owned enterprises and firms in non-heavy polluting industries. Furtherly, it is found that the policy implementation has suppressed firms' total factor productivity but has improved local environmental performance. Based on the above results, a series of policy recommendations are put forward.

How Emotional Interaction Affects Purchase Intention in Social Commerce: The Role of Perceived Usefulness and Product Type.

PURPOSE: On the basis of stimulus-organism-response (SOR) theory, this study extends the work of Lee and Kwon by examining the concept of perceived usefulness as a mediator between emotional interaction (familiarity and intimacy) and purchase intention. The consumer purchase decision model, in which product type plays a moderating role in the linking mechanism, is also explored. METHODS: We proposed a consumer purchase decision model, and empirically examined it by means of an online questionnaire survey. Confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling with bootstrapping estimation were conducted using the data obtained from 269 social commerce users. RESULTS: Familiarity and intimacy positively affected the users' purchase intention in social commerce. Perceived usefulness mediated the relationship between emotional interaction and purchase intention. Moreover, product type moderated the following relationships: between familiarity and purchase intention, between intimacy and purchase intention, and between perceived usefulness and purchase intention. CONCLUSION: The results support this study's hypotheses and SOR theory. Purchase intention could be enhanced by improving emotional interaction and perceived usefulness.

Understanding the Effects of Colleague Participation and Public Cause Proximity on Employee Volunteering Intentions: The Moderating Role of Power Distance.

Many organizations encourage their employees to participate in charitable activities as part of their corporate social responsibility strategies. As a result, there has been an increased research interest in employee volunteering behavior. However, while previous research on employee volunteering decisions has focused on both individual-level and organizational-level factors, there has been less focus on peer involvement and volunteer cause proximity. To go some way to filling this research area, this paper conducted two studies to examine the possible effects of colleague participation, colleague position and public cause proximity on employee volunteering intentions. Study 1 found that colleague participation and public cause proximity had significant effects on employee volunteering, and Study 2 found that power distance played a moderating role in the relationship between colleague position and employee volunteering. This study contributes to theoretical research on employee volunteering and provides some information to assist firms retain engaged volunteers.

Two-Stage Super-Efficiency Slacks-Based Model to Assess China's Ecological Wellbeing.

As industrialization and urbanization in China have significantly increased ecological problems such as environmental pollution and resource waste, it has become important to be able to comprehensively assess ecological wellbeing performance (EWP) when seeking high-quality human wellbeing and economic growth within specific ecological limits. Therefore, to explore the EWP spatial and temporal distribution characteristics, this paper established an evaluation index system that considers ecological economic efficiency and economic welfare efficiency from input and output perspectives. The EWPs in 30 Chinese provinces (autonomous regions, municipalities) from 2006 to 2017 were then measured using a two-stage super-efficiency slacks-based model (Super-SBM) and data envelopment analysis (DEA) window analysis method. It was found that: (1) the average EWP value in the Chinese provinces was relatively low at 0.698, with the highest EWP in Beijing, Hainan, and Shanghai and the lowest in Xinjiang, Ningxia, and Qinghai; (2) the average provincial EWP fluctuated from 2006 to 2017 with a "decline-rise-decline-rise" feature; (3) China's EWP value was spatially supported by the quadrangular "Beijing-Shanghai-Hainan-Sichuan" pole and continued to radiate to areas along these lines. These research findings provide theoretical insights and practical implications for regional ecological protection and human welfare improvements in China.

Structure Reversal of Online Public Opinion for the Heterogeneous Health Concerns under NIMBY Conflict Environmental Mass Events in China.

Public opinions play an important role in the formation of Not in My Back Yard (NIMBY) conflict environmental mass events. Due to the continual interactions between affected groups and the corresponding government responses surrounding the public interests related to health, online public opinion structure reversal arises frequently in NIMBY conflict events, which pose a serious threat to social public security. To explore the underlying mechanism, this paper introduces an improved dynamic model which considers multiple heterogeneities in health concerns and social power of individuals and in government's ability. The experimental results indicate that the proposed model can provide an accurate description of the entire process of online public opinion structure reversal in NIMBY conflict environmental mass incidents on the Internet. In particular, the proportion of the individual agents without health interest appeals will delay the online public opinion structure reversal, and the upper threshold remains within regulatory limits from 0.4 to 0.5. Unlike some previous results that show that the guiding powers of the opinion leaders varied over its ratio in a fixed-sized group, our results suggest that the impact of opinion leaders is of no significant difference for the time of structure reversal after it increased to about 6%. Furthermore, a double threshold effect of online structure reversal during the government's response process was observed. The findings are beneficial for understanding and explaining the process of online public opinion structure reversal in NIMBY conflict environmental mass incidents, and provides theoretical and practical implications for guiding public or personal health opinions on the Internet and for a governments' effective response to them.