Topic： Attention Online, Abatement Offline: A National Experiment on Social Media in China
Time: 9-11 a.m. Mar 17, 2021
Venue: Conference Room 127, Wenqin Building
Host: Professor Lu Yuanping
Guest Speaker: Zou Wei
Doctoral Candidate jointly trained by Sun Yat-sen University and National University of Singapore
Introduction:
This paper investigates the responses of firms and governments to social media activities. The unexpected release and short-lived circulation of the environmental documentary Under the Dome in China in 2015, offers a natural experiment. Based on a comprehensive firm-level dataset together with various web-scraped data on social media activities, online petitions, and government regulatory actions, we find that more public attention to the documentary, measured by social media posts, leads to significantly fewer pollutant emissions of local firms. IV and placebo tests suggest that this impact is not driven by unobserved heterogeneity or omitted variable bias. We show that firms improve environmental behavior in response to consumer pressures. Furthermore, local governments strengthen the environment in response to the rising public attention.