IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v13y2021i11p5882-d560897.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Impact of Sustainability Awareness and Moral Values on Environmental Laws

Author

Listed:
  • Rita Yi Man Li

    (Sustainable Real Estate Research Center, Hong Kong Shue Yan University, Hong Kong)

  • Yi Lut Li

    (Hastings & Co., Gloucester Tower, 11, Hong Kong)

  • M. James C. Crabbe

    (Wolfson College, Oxford University, Oxford OX2 6UD, UK
    Institute of Biomedical and Environmental Science and Technology, University of Bedfordshire, Luton LU1 3JU, UK
    School of Life Science, Shanxi University, Taiyuan 030006, China)

  • Otilia Manta

    (Romanian Academy, Center for Financial and Monetary Research, Victor Slăvescu, 050711 Bucharest, Romania
    Romania Victor Slăvescu, Romanian American University, 050711 Bucharest, Romania)

  • Muhammad Shoaib

    (Department of Architecture, Built Environment and Construction Engineering, Politecnico di Milano, 20133 Milan, Italy)

Abstract

We argue that environmental legislation and regulation of more developed countries reflects significantly their moral values, but in less developed countries it differs significantly from their moral values. We examined this topic by using the keywords “sustainability” and “sustainable development”, studying web pages and articles published between 1974 to 2018 in Web of Science, Scopus and Google. Australia, Zimbabwe, and Uganda were ranked as the top three countries in the number of Google searches for sustainability. The top five cities that appeared in sustainability searches through Google are all from Africa. In terms of academic publications, China, India, and Brazil record among the largest numbers of sustainability and sustainable development articles in Scopus. Six out of the ten top productive institutions publishing sustainable development articles indexed in Scopus were located in developing countries, indicating that developing countries are well aware of the issues surrounding sustainable development. Our results show that when environmental law reflects moral values for betterment, legal adoption is more likely to be successful, which usually happens in well-developed regions. In less-developed states, environmental law differs significantly from moral values, such that changes in moral values are necessary for successful legal implementation. Our study has important implications for the development of policies and cultures, together with the enforcement of environmental laws and regulations in all countries.

Suggested Citation

  • Rita Yi Man Li & Yi Lut Li & M. James C. Crabbe & Otilia Manta & Muhammad Shoaib, 2021. "The Impact of Sustainability Awareness and Moral Values on Environmental Laws," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(11), pages 1-26, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:13:y:2021:i:11:p:5882-:d:560897
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/11/5882/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/11/5882/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. David O. Yawson & Frederick A. Armah & Alex N. M. Pappoe, 2009. "Enabling Sustainability: Hierarchical Need-Based Framework for Promoting Sustainable Data Infrastructure in Developing Countries," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 1(4), pages 1-14, November.
    2. Niclas Berggren, 2006. "Legal positivism and property rights: a critique of Hayek and Peczenik," Constitutional Political Economy, Springer, vol. 17(3), pages 217-235, September.
    3. Goel, Rajeev K. & Nelson, Michael A. & Naretta, Michael A., 2012. "The internet as an indicator of corruption awareness," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 28(1), pages 64-75.
    4. Yue, Xin & Wu, Ye & Hao, Jiming & Pang, Yuan & Ma, Yao & Li, Yi & Li, Boshi & Bao, Xiaofeng, 2015. "Fuel quality management versus vehicle emission control in China, status quo and future perspectives," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 79(C), pages 87-98.
    5. Ghi-Feng Yen & Hsin-Ti Yang, 2018. "Does Consumer Empathy Influence Consumer Responses to Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility? The Dual Mediation of Moral Identity," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(6), pages 1-17, May.
    6. Shola Oyedeji & Ahmed Seffah & Birgit Penzenstadler, 2018. "A Catalogue Supporting Software Sustainability Design," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(7), pages 1-30, July.
    7. Michael Hagerty, 1999. "Testing Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs: National Quality-of-Life Across Time," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 46(3), pages 249-271, March.
    8. Priyam Das & Kenneth R. Tamminga, 2012. "The Ganges and the GAP: An Assessment of Efforts to Clean a Sacred River," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 4(8), pages 1-22, July.
    9. Stern, David I. & Common, Michael S. & Barbier, Edward B., 1996. "Economic growth and environmental degradation: The environmental Kuznets curve and sustainable development," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 24(7), pages 1151-1160, July.
    10. Jun, Seung-Pyo & Yoo, Hyoung Sun & Choi, San, 2018. "Ten years of research change using Google Trends: From the perspective of big data utilizations and applications," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 130(C), pages 69-87.
    11. Giorgio Prodi & Francesco Nicolli & Federico Frattini, 2017. "State restructuring and subnational innovation spaces across Chinese prefectures," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 35(1), pages 94-112, February.
    12. Rita Yi Man Li & Ka Yi Cheng & Muhammad Shoaib, 2018. "Walled Buildings, Sustainability, and Housing Prices: An Artificial Neural Network Approach," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(4), pages 1-17, April.
    13. Serdar Durdyev & Edmundas Kazimieras Zavadskas & Derek Thurnell & Audrius Banaitis & Ali Ihtiyar, 2018. "Sustainable Construction Industry in Cambodia: Awareness, Drivers and Barriers," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(2), pages 1-19, February.
    14. Thi Thu Huong Nguyen & Zhi Yang & Ninh Nguyen & Lester W. Johnson & Tuan Khanh Cao, 2019. "Greenwash and Green Purchase Intention: The Mediating Role of Green Skepticism," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(9), pages 1-16, May.
    15. Giorgio Prodi & Federico Frattini & Francesco Nicolli, 2018. "The diffusion and embeddedness of innovative activities in China," Economia Politica: Journal of Analytical and Institutional Economics, Springer;Fondazione Edison, vol. 35(1), pages 71-106, April.
    16. Félix Moya-Anegón & Zaida Chinchilla-Rodríguez & Benjamín Vargas-Quesada & Elena Corera-Álvarez & Francisco José Muñoz-Fernández & Antonio González-Molina & Victor Herrero-Solana, 2007. "Coverage analysis of Scopus: A journal metric approach," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 73(1), pages 53-78, October.
    17. Rita Yi Man Li & Herru Ching Yu Li, 2018. "Have Housing Prices Gone with the Smelly Wind? Big Data Analysis on Landfill in Hong Kong," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(2), pages 1-19, January.
    18. Yang, Xin & Pan, Bing & Evans, James A. & Lv, Benfu, 2015. "Forecasting Chinese tourist volume with search engine data," Tourism Management, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 386-397.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Lucian Mocrei-Rebrean, 2022. "The Lockean Proviso and Orbital Sustainability—An Anthropological View," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(7), pages 1-13, March.
    2. Tao Xie & Jianguo Du & Kofi Baah Boamah & Lingyan Xu & Mingyue Ma, 2023. "The Internal and External Factors of Environmental Destructive Behavior in the Supply Chain: New Evidence from the Perspective of Brand-Name Products," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(5), pages 1-19, March.
    3. Syamsiyatul Muzayyanah & Cheng-Yih Hong & Rishan Adha & Su-Fen Yang, 2023. "The Non-Linear Relationship between Air Pollution, Labor Insurance and Productivity: Multivariate Adaptive Regression Splines Approach," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(12), pages 1-20, June.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Zhongchen Song & Tom Coupé, 2023. "Predicting Chinese consumption series with Baidu," Journal of Chinese Economic and Business Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 21(3), pages 429-463, July.
    2. Giorgio Prodi & Francesco Nicolli & Federico Frattini, 2020. "Embeddedness and local patterns of innovation: evidence from Chinese prefectural cities," Economic Complexity and Evolution, in: Andreas Pyka & Keun Lee (ed.), Innovation, Catch-up and Sustainable Development, pages 283-307, Springer.
    3. Takahashi, Carlos Kazunari & Figueiredo, Júlio César Bastos de & Scornavacca, Eusebio, 2024. "Investigating the diffusion of innovation: A comprehensive study of successive diffusion processes through analysis of search trends, patent records, and academic publications," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 198(C).
    4. Serhan Cevik, 2022. "Where should we go? Internet searches and tourist arrivals," International Journal of Finance & Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 27(4), pages 4048-4057, October.
    5. Cheraghali, Hamid & Høydal, Hannah & Lysebo, Caroline & Molnár, Peter, 2023. "Consumer attention and company performance: Evidence from luxury companies," Finance Research Letters, Elsevier, vol. 58(PA).
    6. Juan D Montoro-Pons & Manuel Cuadrado-García, 2021. "Analyzing online search patterns of music festival tourists," Tourism Economics, , vol. 27(6), pages 1276-1300, September.
    7. Shahbaz, Muhammad & Hoang, Thi Hong Van & Mahalik, Mantu Kumar & Roubaud, David, 2017. "Energy consumption, financial development and economic growth in India: New evidence from a nonlinear and asymmetric analysis," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 63(C), pages 199-212.
    8. Tihana Škrinjarić, 2019. "Time Varying Spillovers between the Online Search Volume and Stock Returns: Case of CESEE Markets," IJFS, MDPI, vol. 7(4), pages 1-30, October.
    9. Zanin, Luca & Marra, Giampiero, 2012. "Assessing the functional relationship between CO2 emissions and economic development using an additive mixed model approach," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 29(4), pages 1328-1337.
    10. Kaika, Dimitra & Zervas, Efthimios, 2013. "The environmental Kuznets curve (EKC) theory. Part B: Critical issues," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 1403-1411.
    11. Yue, Shen & Munir, Irfan Ullah & Hyder, Shabir & Nassani, Abdelmohsen A. & Qazi Abro, Muhammad Moinuddin & Zaman, Khalid, 2020. "Sustainable food production, forest biodiversity and mineral pricing: Interconnected global issues," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 65(C).
    12. Yiridoe, Emmanuel K. & Nanang, David M., 2001. "An Econometric Analysis Of The Causes Of Tropical Deforestation: Ghana," 2001 Annual meeting, August 5-8, Chicago, IL 20750, American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association).
    13. Ricardo Arencibia-Jorge & Felix Moya-Anegón, 2010. "Challenges in the study of Cuban scientific output," Scientometrics, Springer;Akadémiai Kiadó, vol. 83(3), pages 723-737, June.
    14. Juan Antonio Duro & Jordi Teixidó-Figueras & Emilio Padilla, 2017. "The Causal Factors of International Inequality in $$\hbox {CO}_{2}$$ CO 2 Emissions Per Capita: A Regression-Based Inequality Decomposition Analysis," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 67(4), pages 683-700, August.
    15. Bradford David F. & Fender Rebecca A & Shore Stephen H. & Wagner Martin, 2005. "The Environmental Kuznets Curve: Exploring a Fresh Specification," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 4(1), pages 1-28, June.
    16. Ghimire, Narishwar & Woodward, Richard T., 2013. "Under- and over-use of pesticides: An international analysis," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 89(C), pages 73-81.
    17. Jha, Raghbendra & Murthy, K. V. Bhanu, 2003. "An inverse global environmental Kuznets curve," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 31(2), pages 352-368, June.
    18. Shuaibing Zhang & Kaixu Zhao & Shuoyang Ji & Yafang Guo & Fengqi Wu & Jingxian Liu & Fei Xie, 2022. "Evolution Characteristics, Eco-Environmental Response and Influencing Factors of Production-Living-Ecological Space in the Qinghai–Tibet Plateau," Land, MDPI, vol. 11(7), pages 1-26, July.
    19. G. Mythili & Shibashis Mukherjee, 2011. "Examining Environmental Kuznets Curve for river effluents in India," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 13(3), pages 627-640, June.
    20. Alberto Bertossi & Stefania Troiano & Francesco Marangon, 2022. "Where is sustainability? An assessment of vending products," RIVISTA DI STUDI SULLA SOSTENIBILITA', FrancoAngeli Editore, vol. 0(1), pages 155-180.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:13:y:2021:i:11:p:5882-:d:560897. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.