超额区县设置的环境效应研究

Research on the Environmental Effects of Excess County-Level Divisions

中文关键词:  超额区县  环境效应  行政区划  资源错配

英文关键词:excess county-level divisions  environmental effects  administrative divisions  resource misallocation

中文摘要:

      行政区划作为国家治理的实体单元，对深入推进环境污染防治攻坚战至关重要。文章基于2000—2022年中国省级面板数据，从行政区划视角出发探讨超额区县设置对环境质量的影响及作用机制。研究结果表明：辖区内存在超额区县会增加人均碳排放量。机制分析表明，超额区县主要通过市场要素的错配效应和政府行为的偏离效应影响地区环境质量，资本错配和环保投入挤出是超额区县设置影响环境质量的重要渠道，劳动力错配和环境监管弱化机制尚不明显。异质性分析表明，超额区县对环境质量的影响在市场化、信息化程度更高的地区及东部地区更为明显。本文为理解行政区划设置与环境质量之间的因果关系提供新的分析思路和经验证据，也为推进行政区划调整、改善生态环境治理、实现更高水平区域协调发展提供实践参考。

英文摘要:

      Administrative divisions, serving as tangible units of national governance, play a crucial role in advancing the battle against environmental pollution. Based on China’s provincial-level panel data from 2000 to 2022, this paper investigate the impact and mechanism of excess county-level divisions on environmental quality from an administrative division perspective. The results demonstrate that the presence of excess county-level divisions within a jurisdiction increases per capita carbon emissions. Mechanism analysis reveals that such divisions mainly affect regional environmental quality through misallocation effects and deviation effects at both market behavior and government behavior levels. Capital misallocation and the crowding-out effect on environmental protection investments serve as significant pathways through which excess county-level divisions affects environmental quality, while labor misallocation mechanism and environmental regulation weakening mechanism remain statistically insignificant. Heterogeneity analysis further indicates that the negative impacts of excess counties on environmental governance is more pronounced in regions with higher levels of marketization and informatization, as well as in eastern China. This study provides a novel analytical perspective and empirical evidence for understanding the causal relationship between administrative division configuration and environmental quality, while also providing practical insights for advancing administrative boundary realignment, improving ecological environmental governance, and achieving high-level regional coordinated development.