环境冲突是经济发展的副产品吗?——基于1998-2013年中国省级面板数据的分析

Are Environmental Conflicts the Byproduct of Economic Growth? Evidence from Provincial Panel Data of 1998-2013 in China

近年来环境冲突事件的不断显现,逐渐成为影响社会稳定的不利因素之一,而目前针对经济发展与环境冲突关系的实证研究仍然十分匮乏。文章通过构建一个两阶段回归模型,使用中国1998-2013年30个省级行政单位的面板数据,首次就经济发展对环境冲突的影响机制进行了实证检验,并且通过构建面板门槛回归模型,进一步检验了不同经济发展水平对环境冲突的影响差异。结果显示:经济发展提升了居民的环境偏好和维权意识,同时也对生态环境产生了不利影响,这是引起环境冲突的主要原因。从这个角度讲,环境冲突是经济发展的副产品。但是环境冲突并不会随着经济的发展而呈现出不断增长的趋势,间接效应的检验结果显示,经济发展可以通过优化经济结构、提升生产技术来改善环境质量从而对环境冲突产生抑制效应;并且门槛模型的进一步检验结果证实了当经济发展水平达到一定程度之后,居民的环境偏好存在边际效应递减现象。总体来看,环境冲突将随着经济发展而逐渐减少。文章的研究对厘清经济发展与环境冲突之间的关系,有效防范和治理环境冲突具有重要的启示作用。

In recent years,China＇s economic development has been significantly improved,but at the same time,a large number of pollution emissions have also been produced,greatly destroying the ecological environment.Environmental conflicts caused by environmental pollution are constantly emerging in China,and gradually become one of the negative factors that affect social stability.Then,when economic development brings environmental pollution,does it also bring environmental conflicts as the byproduct？However,the empirical research on the relationship between economic development and environmental conflicts is still very scarce.On the one hand,economic development promotes the individuals＇ income level,but also improves the individuals＇ environmental preference and rights awareness,providing the conditions for environmental conflicts.On the other hand,as one of the main byproducts of economic development,environmental pollution mainly accounts for environmental conflicts.Economic development can indirectly bring out environmental conflicts by producing environmental pollution,but high-level economic development may also make the ecological environment gradually improved,thereby inhibiting environmental conflicts.Therefore,when examining the impact mechanism of economic development on environmental conflicts,it is necessary to distinguish the direct and indirect effects of economic development on environmental conflicts. Through a two-stage regression model,this paper estimates the impact mechanism of economic development on environmental conflicts for the first time based on panel data of30 provinces from 1998 to 2013.In the two-stage regression model,the first stage regression model is used to estimate the net effect of economic development on environmental pollution.By using the fitting value of environmental pollution in the first-stage regression,we estimate the direct impacts of economic development and environmental pollution on environmental conflicts in the second-stage regression after controlling legal environment,income inequality,urbanization and other factors affecting environmental conflicts.Then,we combine the estimation coefficients of the first-stage regression with the estimation coefficients of the second-stage regression to calculate the indirect effect of economic development on environmental conflicts.In addition,individuals＇ environmental preference may have a diminishing marginal effect,so we further investigate the impacts of economic development at different levels on environmental conflicts by constructing apanel threshold regression model. The results suggest that economic development has promoted the residents＇ environmental preference and rights awareness,and also destroys the ecological environment,being the main causes of environmental conflicts.In this sense,environmental conflicts are the byproduct of economic development.But this does not mean that the environment conflicts will continue to grow as economic development improves.The indirect effects show further economic development can optimize the economic structure,improve production technology and then the environmental quality and thus have an inhibitory effect on environmental conflicts.Moreover,the results of testing the threshold model confirm that when the economic development level has reached a certain level,individuals＇ environmental preference suffers from diminishing marginal effect.Therefore,environmental conflicts gradually decrease as the economy develops as a whole.The research of this paper is of great significance to the clarification of the relationship between economic development and environmental conflicts,effective prevention and control of environmental conflicts and the maintenance of social stability and sustainable development.