Abstract

As in many developing countries, the enforcement of environmental regulations in China is considerably more problematic than their promulgation. Indeed, for the past two decades, China has been aggressively passing environmental laws, many of which have been very progressive and which mandate harsh penalties for non-compliance. Unfortunately, in spite of some very notable efforts, it appears that the bulk of these regulations are not being uniformly implemented across China and that many of the country's environmental problems appear to be getting worse. In this seminar, Carlos Wing-hung Lo will introduce research in environmental regulatory enforcement in both urban and rural China undertaken with his collaborators since late 1990. The main focuses of their research are on regulatory styles and effectiveness of enforcement. At the same time, he will present a recent paper which examines changes in regulatory enforcement styles among environmental enforcement officials in the context of China's institutional environment, using panel data collected in Guangzhou in 2000 and 2006.