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  • September–October 2018
  • Article
  • Organization Science

The Paradox of Responsive Authoritarianism: How Civic Activism Spurs Environmental Penalties in China

By: Christopher Marquis and Yanhua Bird
  • Format:Print
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Abstract

Recognizing the need to better understand institutional change processes in authoritarian states, which play an increasingly prominent role in the world economy, we examine the efficacy of civic activism aimed at spurring governmental action concerning the environmental performance of firms in China. We highlight the paradox of “responsive authoritarianism” on display in China: to avoid needing to rule by coercion alone, the government seeks citizens’ feedback and tolerates pressures for change, but at the same time it resists the associated legitimacy threats regarding its capacity to rule. Local governments and the media play crucial and dual roles in this system: they mitigate change pressures from civic activism that takes place within the state’s systems, but they magnify change pressures from publicly visible civic activism occurring outside those systems. We test our conceptual model using a unique dataset of environmental penalties imposed on Chinese publicly listed firms from 2007 to 2011. Our findings contribute to understanding processes of institutional change and outcomes of social movements.

Keywords

Civic Activism; Authoritarianism; Regulation; Corporate Sustainability; Environmental Sustainability; Government and Politics; Business and Government Relations; Social Issues; Change; China

Citation

Marquis, Christopher, and Yanhua Bird. "The Paradox of Responsive Authoritarianism: How Civic Activism Spurs Environmental Penalties in China." Organization Science 29, no. 5 (September–October 2018): 948–968.
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    Assessing and Improving Working Conditions at Global Supply Chain Factories

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    The Globalization of Corporate Environmental Disclosure: Accountability or Greenwashing?

    By: Christopher Marquis, Michael W. Toffel and Yanhua Zhou
More from the Authors
  • Coupling Labor Codes of Conduct and Supplier Labor Practices: The Role of Internal Structural Conditions By: Yanhua Bird, Jodi L. Short and Michael W. Toffel
  • Assessing and Improving Working Conditions at Global Supply Chain Factories By: Michael W. Toffel and Yanhua Zhou
  • The Globalization of Corporate Environmental Disclosure: Accountability or Greenwashing? By: Christopher Marquis, Michael W. Toffel and Yanhua Zhou
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