The Porter Hypothesis: a literature review on the relationship between eco-innovation and environmental regulation
“波特假说”——生态创新与环境管制的关系研究述评

Environmental regulation has been considered as an important factor which influences eco-innovation. The relationship between environmental regulation and eco-innovation is addressed by the famous Porter Hypothesis: environmental regulation can stimulate firms to carry out eco-innovation and then build the competitive advantage. This paper started from the interpretation of the meaning of the Porter Hypothesis, and did a literature survey on related studies from both empirical and theoretical perspectives. It indicated that: most empirical studies validated the Weak Porter Hypothesis, i.e. environmental regulation can stimulate eco-innovation; consensus has not been reached on the Strong Porter Hypothesis, with the controversy rooting in whether eco-innovation can bring a harmony between environmental performance and competition performance. In short, the environmental policy does have a positive or negative role on eco-innovation. The direction and strength of the impact depends on the type of environmental policy, the type of eco-innovation, the stages of eco-innovation, as well as some characteristics of the regulated object itself. Based on the above reviewing work, this paper indentified the directions for future research in the field of environmental regulation and eco-innovation, including deepening the theoretical research, extending the scope of research, strengthening studies on the accumulative effect and superimposed effect of environmental policies as well as the empirical and applied research in the Chinese context.