Suchergebnisse

Abstract
The Chief Officials' Appearance System (COAS), introduced in 2015, requires government leaders to appear in court and explain their actions. Unlike other post-2014 legal reforms aimed at reducing political influence in administrative litigation, the COAS uniquely actively involves political officials. This approach is based on the belief that increased participation will help officials to gain a better understanding of public concerns and improve administrative litigation quality. However, few studies have examined the system's effectiveness, and existing research relies on anecdotal evidence with limited analysis. To address this gap, we conducted a systematic empirical inquiry using 1,551 administrative litigation cases filed in a Beijing local court and extensive field research in 12 other provinces. Contrary to official expectations, we found the system reproduced the administrative grievances it was tasked with resolving. Moreover, when chief officials appear in court, administrative litigation is characterized by a renewed triad of apathetic state agencies, increasingly agitated plaintiffs and strategically empowered courts.

Do active judicial reviews bring about better administrative performance? Most scholars argue that active judicial review creates animosity between the judiciary and administration, leading to bad administrative performance. Others advocate that the relationship is not so much hostile as it is constructive. However, the actual impact of and mechanisms enabling such a constructive relationship remain unclear. Employing an analysis of Public Interest Litigation against the Administration ( PILA) in environmental protection cases in China, we present a theory of "bargaining in the shadow of judicial review." The threat of imminent judicial review forces the administration to negotiate with the prosecutor and enhance its performance in exchange for dropping charges. Additionally, the effect of PILA is stronger in regions with more public environmental concern and weaker in regions where the higher-level public administration pays greater attention to environmental protection. Furthermore, we identify the impact of PILA on local governments' enforcement efforts and its legitimacy. The present study sheds new light on the long-standing debate on managerialism versus legalism.

AbstractThe corporate sector strives to improve its environmental, social, and governance (ESG) performance to transition from short‐term to sustainable long‐term profit maximisation. This study thus explores the impact of ESG performance on the financial sustainability (FS) of a sample of the top 100 global high‐tech firms. Specifically, we employ the two‐step generalised method of moments to control for endogeneity bias and a panel data fixed effects model to control for unobserved heterogeneity. Empirical findings reveal that overall ESG performance has a statistically negative association with the FS of global high‐tech firms. Individual pillar‐wise analysis reveals that the environmental and social (governance) pillar has a negative (positive) association with the FS of the sampled firms. This result proves that each ESG pillar exerts varying effects on corporate performance indicators. Overall, the results provide empirical evidence that could help policymakers devise policies for investing optimally in ESG indicators to spur corporate FS.