Resource dependency, perceived political environment, and ENGO advocacy under authoritarian rule

ABSTRACT

ENGOs are an essential part of the institutional fabric of environmental governance. A key issue is how they participate in environmental policymaking through different strategies, including legal, administrative, and media advocacy. Using original data on Chinese ENGOs, this article examines how ENGOs’ dependency on government funding and donations, and their perceptions of the broader political environment, affect their engagement in policy advocacy. Our empirical analysis shows that a) government funding increases ENGOs’ engagement in all advocacy strategies, whereas donations reduce administrative advocacy; and b) the perceived political environment affects ENGO advocacy strategies by changing the dynamics between funders and ENGOs, triggering caution against political risks and increasing ENGOs’ dependence on donors. This study highlights how a restrictive political environment shapes ENGOs’ relations with the state and their philanthropic donors in environmental governance.

KEYWORDS:

• ENGO
• policy advocacy
• political environment
• resources
• China

Disclosure statement

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

Notes

1 We chose not to focus on legislative advocacy because a) legislative processes are relatively closed to non-governmental entities and b) NGOs have limited capacity and leverage to influence these processes. In our survey, we asked ENGO leaders to report their engagement with the People’s Congress and People’s Political Consultative Conference at the state and local levels over the past three years, and the results show that NGOs have had minimal contact with these legislative bodies.

2 The direct effect of donations is marginally significant at p = 0.1 in Model 4, and the main effects of donation in Models 5 and 6 are not statistically significant, suggesting that the effect of donations is unstable and uncertain.

3 One should note that the confidence intervals associated with the predicted value of legal advocacy are notably wider than that for administrative advocacy, suggesting less certainty in the government funding-legal advocacy relationship than the donations-administrative advocacy relationship.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Research Grants Council, University Grants Committee [Grant number GRF 14609519].

Notes on contributors

Hui Li

Hui Li is an assistant professor in the Department of Politics and Public Administration at the University of Hong Kong. Her research focuses on public and nonprofit management, collaboration, civil society and governance, and civic engagement—issues that link nonprofits and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) to the policy process.

Shui-Yan Tang

Shui-Yan Tang is the Frances R. and John J. Duggan Professor of Public Administration in the Price School of Public Policy at the University of Southern California. His research focuses on institutional analysis and design, common-pool resource governance, and collaborative governance.

Carlos Wing-Hung Lo

Carlos Wing-Hung Lo is professor and head of the Department of Government and Public Administration at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. His main research interests are in the areas of law and government, environmental management, public sector management, cultural heritage management, and corporate social and environmental responsibility, within the contexts of China and Hong Kong.