Linguistics

Philosophy

Ecology

Biology

Enforcement

Environmental management system

Government (linguistics)

Legislation

Economics

Environmental governance

Environmental law

Business

Corporate governance

Environmental planning

Public participation

Political science

Public economics

Environmental quality

Environmental science

Local government

Public administration

Finance

Irrigation

The Science of The Total Environment

The improvement of regional environmental quality (REQ) not only requires local governments to adopt environmental investment, legislation and law enforcement, but also requires the coordination of government environmental governance and public participation. This study analyses the impact mechanism of government environmental governance, public participation and their coordinated effect on the improvement of REQ, which is a comprehensive indicator measured by the emission of waste gas, waste water and waste solids. After empirical analyses using sample data from 30 provinces in China, the results show that, REQ has been increasingly deteriorating; the effects of government's environmental investment, legislation and law enforcement on REQ improvement are significantly positive, and public participation also helps to stimulate REQ. There also exists a coordinated effect between government environmental governance and public participation. Compared with citizen participation, environmental non-government organisations' participation has a more significant positive effect on REQ improvement. Finally, the influence of government environmental governance and public participation on REQ has significant spatial heterogeneity. The conclusions above can provide inspiration for Chinese government to improve the environmental governance system, which is good for the improvement of REQ.

Improvement of regional environmental quality: Government environmental governance and public participation