Internationalization, Corporate Governance, and Environmental Sustainability

Jing Yan ()
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Jing Yan: The School of International Trade & Economics, Central University of Finance and Economics, Beijing 102206, China

Sustainability, 2025, vol. 17, issue 6, 1-16

Abstract: (1) Purpose: In recent decades, sustainability has become an important concept across the globe. Poor environmental performance is likely to put firms at risk of public censure and even environmental litigation, especially those operating in international markets. It is critical to understand how firms’ operations affect environmental performance. This study investigates how firms’ corporate governance actors interact with internationalization to shape environmental sustainability outcomes. (2) Design: Using a panel of data from 2008 to 2022 on listed Chinese companies, this study builds a moderation model to test proposed hypotheses. (3) Findings: This study shows that corporate governance actors play a moderating role in the relationship between internationalization and environmental performance. It also shows that internationalization is less likely to promote environmental performance in state-owned enterprises. (4) Originality: This study enriches the literature on international business and sustainability by advancing our understanding of the mechanisms through which internationalization improves the environmental performance of businesses. This study also contributes to the literature on corporate governance and environmental sustainability outcomes by investigating the global dimension of environmental sustainability issues.

Keywords: internationalization; corporate governance; environmental sustainability; CEO duality; board size; supervisory board; ownership (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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