Climate Change Legislations and Environmental Degradation
- PDF / 758,591 Bytes
- 30 Pages / 439.37 x 666.142 pts Page_size
- 49 Downloads / 208 Views
Climate Change Legislations and Environmental Degradation Nicolae Stef1 · Sami Ben Jabeur2 Accepted: 18 October 2020 © Springer Nature B.V. 2020
Abstract This study investigates how the enactment of regulations and laws dealing with climate change influences C O2 emissions. Using a sample of 83 countries and covering the period from 2003 to 2014, our dynamic panel analysis yields two major results. First, the enact‑ ment of new climate change regulations (i.e., amendments, decrees, orders) associated with a strong rule of law significantly diminishes CO2 emissions. This result validates the hypothesis of Gunningham (J Environ Law 23:169–201, 2011. https://doi.org/10.1093/jel/ eqr006), which argues that the efficiency of environmental legislation must be supported by regulatory institutions that can efficiently enforce the law. Second, the enactment of new climate change laws seems to not impact emissions levels independently of institutional quality. It may be possible that private agents anticipate the entry into force of the new law(s) and must consequently adapt to the requirements of such laws, leading to a nonsig‑ nificant impact on C O2 emissions. Keywords Legislation · Climate change · CO2 emissions · Institutional quality · Rule of law JEL Classification O13 · P48 · K32
1 Introduction In the early 1970s, Ottinger (1970) noticed that the environmental law of the United States (U.S.) suffered from cornucopia syndrome. Such disorder implies that a legal act encour‑ ages the full right of individuals to control and to exploit all natural resources. In other words, the major shortcoming noticed by Ottinger (1970) in the National Environmental Policy Act enacted in 1970 dealt with a very weak mechanism for enforcing a national policy of environmental protection. With this in mind, he examined the controversial case * Nicolae Stef nicolae.stef@bsb‑education.com Sami Ben Jabeur [email protected] 1
CEREN EA 7477, Burgundy School of Business, Université Bourgogne Franche-Comté, Department of Accounting, Finance & Law, 29 Rue Sambin, 21000 Dijon, France
2
ESDES Business School of UCLyon, 10, Place des Archives, 69002 Lyon, France
13
Vol.:(0123456789)
N. Stef, S. Ben Jabeur
of a planned bridge construction that was supported by the highway lobby but not endorsed by the local community of Washington, D.C. The bridge construction targeted land at a historic recreation site. The highway lobby managed to overcome some legal procedures, and the U.S. Congress adopted a provision in a highway appropriation bill that authorized the construction. Ottinger (1970) argued that a simple amendment to the national constitu‑ tion guaranteeing an unimpaired environment for every citizen might have hampered the bridge’s construction.1 Nevertheless, the enactment of environmental regulations or laws raises the question of efficiency. As suggested by Hsu (2004), the efficiency of an environmental law can be measured in terms of either utility or wealth. However, the quantification of utility may be problemati
Data Loading...
