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Political influence on environmental sanction charges in Swedish municipalities

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Abstract

Earlier literature has established that enforcement of the Swedish Environmental Code varies greatly across municipalities. This is problematic due to differences in application of the law and from an efficiency perspective. This study shows that the variation can to some extent be explained by the ruling political coalition. Green Party representation in the ruling coalition is estimated to have a positive effect on the number of environmental sanction charges handed out by the local environmental offices. A difference in differences approach and IV- estimation is used to address the endogeneity issues. I argue for the random distribution of local party representation in the municipal council and use the absence of local parties as an instrument for Green Party representation in the ruling coalition.

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  • Sjöberg, Eric, 2012. "Political influence on environmental sanction charges in Swedish municipalities," Research Papers in Economics 2012:6, Stockholm University, Department of Economics.
  • Handle: RePEc:hhs:sunrpe:2012_0006
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    Cited by:

    1. Vivek Ghosal & Andreas Stephan & Jan F. Weiss, 2019. "Decentralized environmental regulations and plant‐level productivity," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 28(6), pages 998-1011, September.
    2. Ghosal, Vivek & Stephan, Andreas & Weiss, Jan, 2014. "Decentralized Regulation, Environmental Efficiency and Productivity," Ratio Working Papers 229, The Ratio Institute.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Environmental code; Decentralization; Law enforcement;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • K32 - Law and Economics - - Other Substantive Areas of Law - - - Energy, Environmental, Health, and Safety Law
    • K42 - Law and Economics - - Legal Procedure, the Legal System, and Illegal Behavior - - - Illegal Behavior and the Enforcement of Law
    • Q01 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - General - - - Sustainable Development

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