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Eco-efficiency as a Catalyst for Citizen Co-production: Evidence from Chinese Cities

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  • Ruiyu Zhang
  • Lin Nie
  • Ce Zhao
  • Xin Zhao

Abstract

We examine whether higher eco-efficiency encourages local governments to co-produce environmental solutions with citizens. Using Chinese provincial data and advanced textual analysis, we find that high eco-efficiency strongly predicts more collaborative responses to environmental complaints. Causal inference suggests that crossing a threshold of eco-efficiency increases co-production probabilities by about 24 percentage points, indicating eco-efficiency's potential as a catalyst for participatory environmental governance.

Suggested Citation

  • Ruiyu Zhang & Lin Nie & Ce Zhao & Xin Zhao, 2025. "Eco-efficiency as a Catalyst for Citizen Co-production: Evidence from Chinese Cities," Papers 2504.13290, arXiv.org.
    • Handle: RePEc:arx:papers:2504.13290
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    4. Gjalt Huppes & Masanobu Ishikawa, 2005. "A Framework for Quantified Eco‐efficiency Analysis," Journal of Industrial Ecology, Yale University, vol. 9(4), pages 25-41, October.
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    6. R. D. Banker & A. Charnes & W. W. Cooper, 1984. "Some Models for Estimating Technical and Scale Inefficiencies in Data Envelopment Analysis," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 30(9), pages 1078-1092, September.
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