The influence of government transparency on governance efficiency in information age: the environmental governance behavior of Guangdong, China

Purpose: We are in an information age, and the relationship between government governance and market efficiency has become closer. When examining the behavior of governance, the study of government transparency is very important. This paper examines the environmental governance performance of Guangdong province, the most developed coastal region in China. Design/methodology/approach: DEA method is adopted to calculate the environmental governance efficiency by considering the expected output and the nonexpected output. Then Tobit regression was used to analyze the relationship between fiscal transparency and environmental governance efficiency. Findings: Through a quantitative study of empirical data of Guangdong province from 2001 to 2017, it is found that fiscal transparency does have a significant positive impact on the efficiency of local environmental governance. Therefore, it is suggested that all regions in Guangdong should be more transparent in administration, intensify industrial transformation and upgrading, and better govern the regional ecological environment. Originality/value: This paper examines the environmental governance performance of Guangdong province, the most developed coastal region in China. Guangdong has developed economy and people’s living standards are high, so the market and residents are particularly concerned about the government performance in environmental governance. Therefore, it is an important issue to explore the relationship between environmental governance and government transparency in Guangdong.