政府环境审计的绿色响应——来自企业环境关注的证据

张华^a,b，茆文萱^b

（南京审计大学 a.商学院；b.社会审计学院，江苏 南京 211815）

摘要：政府环境审计作为一种制度化的监管工具，对引导企业履行环境责任、增加环境关注至关重要。基于2001—2023年沪深A股上市公司工业企业的面板数据，本文运用普通与强度双重差分模型，识别了政府环境审计对企业环境关注的影响。研究发现，政府环境审计提升了重污染企业的环境关注水平，且这一效应具有持续性。机制检验显示，政府环境审计通过增加企业内部的融资约束与提高风险承担水平，以及强化企业外部的媒体关注等渠道驱动企业环境关注的提升。此外，这种效应因企业、行业和地区而异，对非国有企业、新企业、行业竞争激烈的企业，以及位于高环境规制强度和低审计强度地区的企业作用更为显著。研究结论强调了政府环境审计对微观企业环境战略认知的积极作用。

基金项目：国家社会科学基金一般项目“生态立县战略下异质性环境规制推动县域绿色发展的效应评估与政策优化研究”（23BJY091）；江苏省社会科学基金一般项目“环境规制下公众参与推动江苏降碳、减污、扩绿、增长的机制与路径研究”（23EYB017）；江苏省研究生科研与实践创新计划项目“政府环境审计推动企业绿色转型的机理和路径研究”（SJCX25_1136）

关键词：政府环境审计；企业环境关注；企业绿色行为；环境监管；重污染企业

作者简介：张华，南京审计大学商学院/社会审计学院教授；茆文萱，南京审计大学社会审计学院硕士研究生。

引用格式：张华，茆文萱. 政府环境审计的绿色响应：来自企业环境关注的证据［J］. 首都经济贸易大学学报，2026，28（5）：73-89.

The Green Response to Government Environmental Auditing: Evidence from Corporate Environmental Attention

ZHANG Hua, MAO Wenxuan

(Nanjing Audit University, Nanjing 211815)

Abstract: Amid increasingly severe global environmental challenges, corporate environmental attention has become a key driver of firms' green strategic transformation. As an institutionalized regulatory instrument, government environmental auditing is crucial for guiding firms to fulfill their environmental responsibilities and enhance their environmental attention. Taking the promulgation of the National Audit Office of China's Opinions on Strengthening Resource and Environmental Auditing in 2009 as a quasi-natural experiment, this study selects 3599 industrial listed firms from China's A-share markets from 2001 to 2023 as the sample. Heavily polluting firms are classified as the treatment group, and non-heavily polluting firms as the control group. Ordinary and intensity difference-indifferences models are constructed for empirical testing.

Baseline regression results show that government environmental auditing significantly enhances the environmental attention of heavily polluting firms. Parallel trend tests indicate no significant differences between the treatment and control groups before policy implementation, supporting the baseline findings. The reliability of the core conclusions is further corroborated by a series of robustness checks, including alternative variable specifications, placebo tests, propensity score matching, and controls for confounding policies and extreme events.

Mechanism analysis indicates that government environmental auditing exerts governance effects mainly through three channels. First, through its evaluation and assurance functions, it intensifies financing constraints for heavily polluting firms, compelling them to proactively raise their environmental attention and strengthen environmental governance and disclosure to improve their financing conditions. Second, through its early-warning and guidance functions, it raises firms' risk-taking levels, encouraging them to allocate more resources to risky areas with long-term environmental value. Third, through its monitoring and accountability functions, it enhances media attention and oversight, thereby amplifying societal oversight pressure. Heterogeneity analysis reveals that this positive effect is more pronounced among non-state-owned enterprises, newly established firms, those in highly competitive industries, and those located in regions with high environmental regulation intensity and low auditing intensity.

This paper makes three marginal contributions. First, it extends research on the microeconomic consequences of government environmental auditing by shifting the focus to corporate cognition and strategic intent. Second, it enriches literature on the antecedents of corporate environmental attention, offering new evidence for understanding how corporate environmental cognition is formed. Third, it deepens research on the mechanisms and heterogeneity of government environmental auditing's impact on corporate environmental attention, thereby enhancing the theoretical depth and practical value.

Keywords: government environmental auditing; corporate environmental attention; corporate green behavior; environmental regulation; heavy-polluting enterprise

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