The impacts of political hierarchy on corporate pollution emissions: Evidence from a spatial discontinuity in China

The book explores the social economic processes of inequality produced by differential state entitlements. Drawing on uniquely rich source materials from central and local archives, the book provides an unprecedented, comprehensive view of the creation of a socio-economic and political hierarchy under the Eight Banners in the Qing dynasty in what is now Shuangcheng County, Heilongjiang province. Shuangcheng was settled by bannermen from urban Beijing and elsewhere in rural Manchuria in the nineteenth century. The state classified the immigrants into distinct categories, each associated with differentiated land entitlements. By reconstructing the history of settlement and land distribution in this county, the book shows that patterns of wealth stratification and the underlying social hierarchy were not merely imposed by the state from the top-down but created and reinforced by local people through practices on the ground. In the course of pursuing their own interests, settlers internalized the distinctions created by the state through its system of unequal land entitlements. The tensions built into the unequal land entitlements therefore shaped the identities of immigrant groups, and this social hierarchy persisted after the fall of the Qing in 1911. The book offers an in-depth understanding of the key factors that contributed to social stratification in agrarian societies in the nineteenth- and early twentieth-century China. Moreover, it also sheds light on the many parallels between the stratification system in Qing-dynasty Shuangcheng and the structural inequality in contemporary China.

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COVID-19 and Air Pollution: Measuring Pandemic Impact to Air Quality in Five European Countries

Atmosphere ◽

10.3390/atmos12030290 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 12 (3) ◽

pp. 290

Author(s):

Akvilė Feiferytė Skirienė ◽

Žaneta Stasiškienė

Keyword(s):

Air Pollution ◽

Air Quality ◽

Social Services ◽

Pollution Monitoring ◽

Air Pollution Monitoring ◽

Rapid Spread ◽

Air Quality Improvement ◽

Environment Agency ◽

Pollution Emissions ◽

Air Pollution Emissions

The rapid spread of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic affected the economy, trade, transport, health care, social services, and other sectors. To control the rapid dispersion of the virus, most countries imposed national lockdowns and social distancing policies. This led to reduced industrial, commercial, and human activities, followed by lower air pollution emissions, which caused air quality improvement. Air pollution monitoring data from the European Environment Agency (EEA) datasets were used to investigate how lockdown policies affected air quality changes in the period before and during the COVID-19 lockdown, comparing to the same periods in 2018 and 2019, along with an assessment of the Index of Production variation impact to air pollution changes during the pandemic in 2020. Analysis results show that industrial and mobility activities were lower in the period of the lockdown along with the reduced selected pollutant NO2, PM2.5, PM10 emissions by approximately 20–40% in 2020.

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Impacts of high-speed railway on the industrial pollution emissions in China

Kybernetes ◽

10.1108/k-07-2019-0499 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 49 (11) ◽

pp. 2713-2735 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Xiaomin Fan ◽

Yingzhi Xu ◽

Yongqing Nan ◽

Baoli Li ◽

Haiya Cai

Keyword(s):

Environmental Effects ◽

Industrial Pollution ◽

High Speed ◽

Assessment Method ◽

Economic Effects ◽

High Speed Railway ◽

Central Cities ◽

Content Type ◽

Pollution Emissions ◽

The Impact

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to analyse the impact of high-speed railway (HSR) on industrial pollution emissions using the data for 285 prefecture-level cities in China from 2004 to 2016. Design/methodology/approach The research method used in this paper is the multi-period difference-in-differences (DID) model, which is an effective policy effect assessment method. To further address the issue of endogeneity, the DID integrated with the propensity score matching (PSM-DID) approach is employed to eliminate the potential self-selection bias. Findings The results show that the HSR has significantly reduced industrial pollution emissions, which is validated by several robustness tests. Compared with peripheral cities, HSR exerts a greater impact on industrial pollution emissions in central cities. In addition, the mechanism test reveals that the optimised allocation of inter-city industries is an important channel for HSR to mitigate industrial pollution emissions, and this is closely related to the location of HSR stations. Originality/value Previous studies have paid more attention to evaluating the economic effects of HSR, however, most of these studies overlook its environmental effects. Consequently, the impact of HSR on industrial pollution emissions is led by using multi-period DID models in this paper, in which the environmental effects are measured. The results of this paper can provide a reference for the pollution reduction policies and also the coordinated development of economic growth and environmental quality.

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The impact of land resource mismatch and land marketization on pollution emissions of industrial enterprises in China

Journal of Environmental Management ◽

10.1016/j.jenvman.2021.113565 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 299 ◽

pp. 113565

Author(s):

Weijian Du ◽

Mengjie Li

Keyword(s):

Land Resource ◽

Industrial Enterprises ◽

Pollution Emissions ◽

The Impact

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Impact of some environmental chemical carcinogens on the incidence of hormone-dependent tumors and possible mechanisms of its realization (literary review)

Environment & Health ◽

10.32402/dovkil2021.02.044 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 99 (2) ◽

pp. 44-55

Author(s):

I.O. Chernychenko ◽

◽

N.V. Balenko ◽

O.M. Lytvychenko ◽

V.F. Babii ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Ovarian Cancer ◽

Functional Organization ◽

Endocrine System ◽

Epidemiological Data ◽

Environmental Carcinogens ◽

Chemical Carcinogens ◽

Environmental Chemical ◽

Polycyclic Aromatic ◽

Pollution Emissions

Objective: We determined the possible effects of priority chemical environmental carcinogens on the incidence of hormone-dependent tumors and the mechanisms of their effect on the basis of the analysis of literature data and our own research. Results: The performed analysis demonstrates the scanity of the research devoted to the study of chemical carcinogens which are concerned only with the class of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH), benzo(a)pyrene (BP), atmospheric pollution, emissions from vehicles, the cadmium heavy metal and products of smoking containing these substances. The connection with PAH (BP) and the development of breast, ovarian cancer, cadmium with the development of breast, endometrial, ovarian cancer in women and prostate cancer in men was established. Epidemiological data, combined with experimental ones, suggest a possible contribution of carcinogens into the increase of the incidence of hormone-dependent tumors. At the same time, mechanisms of action of PAH and cadmium on the development of hormone-dependent tumors are unclear. The accumulated experimental and epidemiological data allow us to conclude that the oncological danger of these carcinogens lies in the combination of genotoxic and hormone-mimetic properties; the main mechanisms, involved in the realization of the effect of BP and cadmium, are associated with changes and disorders at different levels of the structural and functional organization of the organism, including the endocrine system, which can lead to the development of tumors. The urgency of the problem of the incidence of hormone-dependent tumors and the potential role of the studied chemical carcinogens as pollutants of the environment of human functions indicate the need to take these circumstances into account when developing and implementing preventive measures.

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