Assessing the energy resources policy agenda: Evidence from China's green express policy

Green Economy Recovery Plan is a respond to “wicked problems” in urban development. Exploration of the policy process and knowledge patterns in this plan can significantly enhance the science of urban decision-making. The development of electronic commerce has led to an increase in express waste, and the development of green consumption has become a focal point for the entire society. China's Green Transformation Express Packaging Policy was quickly adopted and disseminated in various cities; however, strategies for its promotion are inconsistent across regions. The multiple streams framework (MSF) is a mainstream approach that explores policy agenda setting. Based on the MSF, we employed a mixed methods research to examine the source streams factors that influence the agenda setting of the green transformation express packaging. First, we examine the negative effects of problem streams, policy streams, and political streams on the delay in policy agenda using data from the Chinese prefecture-level cities. Second, we confirm that policy entrepreneurs can advance policy agenda setting in partially coupled streams. Further, we uncovered different categories of policy entrepreneurs through qualitative interviews. This study fills a gap in the quantitative research on green policies within the Chinese context of the MSF and supports the role of partial coupling which is less applied in the MSF. The policy implications of this study are as follows: to consider an incentive mechanism for actively raising green fiscal demands can be included in the appraisal of local officials, to implement green recovery programs when most conditions are present, and to strengthen the role of experts and members of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference in green express policies.