View article

This study examines changes in enforcement styles among environmental enforcement officials in the context of China's rapidly changing institutional environments, using panel data collected in Guangzhou in 2000 and 2006. Altogether, five enforcement style elements were examined—accommodation, prioritization, educational, formalism, and coercion. It was found that in 2006 respondents reported greater reliance on education, formalism, and coercion than in 2000. During the same period 2000–06, no significant changes were found for the enforcement styles of accommodation and prioritization or in the respondents' perceptions of their organization's enforcement effectiveness. From regression models in which enforcement styles were used to predict perceived organizational enforcement effectiveness, it was observed that the coefficient for formalism had changed substantially over this period, from being …