基于助推视角下的居民生活垃圾源头分类行为决策及机制研究

How to involve people in household waste source separation through effective policy design, and therefore promote waste reuse, recycling and reduction is an urgent requirement for breaking through the dilemma of garbage siege around the cities and villages, and is also the connotation that Beautiful China Construction should have. Most of the existing researches explored people’s decision-making on household waste source separation under the framework of the command-controlled and market-incentive intervention policies that traditional economics normally used. The applicant found that the above two types of intervention policies had played little real effect in present China in previous studies. Nudges, which have gained many applications in other fields in recent years, are prove to be an important instrument within the environmental policy toolkit, and can serve as a beneficial complement to existing environmental policies. This project firstly aims to empirically examine the impact of nudge instruments on residents’ decision-making for waste source separation behavior through field experiment, and on this basis, fully reveal the potential mechanism of nudge instruments. Secondly, it will discuss the effectiveness of nudge instruments in inducing inhabitants to carry out waste source separation in detail across contexts and populations. Thirdly, it will systematically investigate the acceptability of residents toward nudge instruments on waste source separation, and also specifically identify the influence of the attributes of nudge instruments and the characteristics of intervention group on the level of acceptance toward nudges instruments. Finally, this project will end up with several pertinent countermeasures that are helpful to adjust and optimize the existing relevant governance policies from the perspective of nudge theory, with a view to providing some valuable insight into how to break through the waste source separation dilemma.

如何通过有效的政策设计诱导人们实施生活垃圾源头分类行为，促进垃圾的回收利用与减量，是突破垃圾围城围村困境的迫切要求和美丽中国建设的应有之意。现有研究大多从命令控制型和市场激励型的干预政策来探究人们的生活垃圾源头分类行为，而申请者的前期研究发现上述干预政策在当下的中国实际收效甚微。近年来兴起的助推政策工具作为环境政策工具箱的重要扩展，可以有效弥补现有环境政策的不足。本课题首先旨在基于田野实验数据实证考察助推工具对居民生活垃圾源头分类行为决策的影响，并揭示助推工具的潜在作用机制；其次，分情境、分群体翔实地讨论助推工具在诱导居民实施生活垃圾源头分类行为中的有效性；再次，系统综合地探讨居民对垃圾分类助推工具的接受程度，并重点考察助推工具属性和干预群体属性对助推工具接受程度的影响。最后，从助推理论的视角提出有利于调整和优化现有相关治理政策的对策思路，以期为突破垃圾源头分类困境提供新的治理路径。

如何通过有效的政策设计诱导公众实施生活垃圾源头分类行为从而推动生活垃圾的回收利用与减量已成为学术界和决策当局者关注的重要议题。利用城市层次的宏观统计数据，本项目首先刻画了生活垃圾管理特征事实和评估了现有生活垃圾源头分类政策，研究结果表明，经济增长显著推动了城市生活垃圾产生量的大幅增加，二者并没有像环境库兹涅茨曲线预测的那样呈倒U型，同时现有生活垃圾管理政策在垃圾减量方面收效甚微。在此背景下，本项目基于家户层面的微观调查数据，细致考察了常用助推工具对居民生活垃圾源头分类行为的影响，研究结果发现，生活垃圾分类试点项目和披露社会规范均显著促进了家户生活垃圾源头分类的参与频率，但助推工具的效果因不同性别、受教育程度、收入、个体主义价值观和社会信任水平的人群呈现明显差异。进一步的机制分析表明，生活垃圾分类试点项目通过显著推动人们的社会互动频率和提升生活垃圾相关知识水平从而促进生活垃圾源头分类，而社会规范通过强化环保法规的约束作用和激活公众环保责任意识来促进生活垃圾源头分类。同时，生活垃圾分类试点项目具有明显的正向溢出效应，其实施不仅会提高其所在相邻城市居民的生活垃圾源头分类水平，而且还增加了试点城市居民自带购物袋和重复使用塑料袋的频率。此外，针对助推政策工具与市场激励型政策工具的组合效果研究表明，垃圾分类容器的提供与生活垃圾定额收费的组合实施并没有强化反而是弱化了生活垃圾源头分类的效果。最后，本项目在上述研究发现的基础上，提出了推进生活垃圾源头分类的治理机制和总体思路，以期为生活垃圾治理乃至环境治理的相关政策设计提供来源于助推视角的理论参考与实证依据。在本项目的支持下，我们发表了中英文论文9篇，包含Waste Management和Resources, Conservation and Recycling等专门针对废弃物管理和资源回收利用的期刊，学术专著1部，与项目相关的博士论文1篇、硕士论文2篇。