Impact of environmental quality indicators on soft power: a few empirical estimates

ABSTRACT

Environmental issues have become unavoidable over the last few decades. Countries are increasingly undergoing decision-making processes that involve impacts on the environment. Among the many possible costs of misuse of the environment, one that has drawn attention is with regard to soft power. In other words, can environmental degradation actually lead to a worsening of countries’ soft power? The empirical answer suggests that it does. In addition, we attempt to identify which specific factors within the environmental issue can have the greatest impact on countries’ soft power. Furthermore, measures that affect people’s health seem to be especially important points of impact on countries’ soft power.

KEYWORDS:

• Soft power
• environment
• ordinary least squares
• panel data

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Sergio R. Vale

Sergio R. Vale is Chief-economist and Partner at MB Associados, Brazil. He has a PhD in International Relations (University of São Paulo-USP) and MSc. in Economics (University of Wisconsin-Madison). He is postdoctoral fellow at the Institute of Advanced Studies at USP.

Moises S. Marques

Moises S. Marques is Deputy Director at Fundação Escola de Sociologia e Política (FESPSP), has a PhD in Political Science (University of São Paulo) and is a member of the Research Group on International Political Economy, Variants of Democracy and Decarbonization at the Institute of Advanced Studies at University of São Paulo.