Would central government's direct supervisions enhance local environmental qualities? Evidence from China

Abstract

With the construction of ecological civilization, central government's direct inspections have become the new norm of environmental protection supervision. Since 2016, the central government has been dispatching supervision teams, one batch after another, to conduct environmental protection supervision in the provinces. In this paper, the regression discontinuity designs were used to study the impact of central environmental protection supervision on the quality of air and water. Our results indicate that air quality was improved significantly during the supervision, while water quality was improved significantly during the rectification period after the supervision. A heterogeneity analysis shows that supervision had a significant impact on highly polluted areas. The results further suggest that for the continuous improvement of environmental quality, it is necessary to build a long-term governance mechanism.