Game Analysis of the Evolution of Local Government’s River Chief System Implementation Strategy

• Published in: International journal of environmental research and public health Vol. 19; no. 4; p. 1961
• Main Authors: Wang, Juan, Wan, Xin, Tu, Ruide
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Switzerland MDPI AG 10.02.2022; MDPI
• Subjects: Effluents; Enforcement; Environmental regulations; Equilibrium; Games; Jurisdiction; Local government; Performance appraisal; Politics; Regulation; Rivers; Water pollution; China; River Chief System; Pareto optimal; evolutionary game; evolutionary stabilization strategy; sewage discharge; local government
• ISSN: 1660-4601; 1661-7827; 1660-4601
• DOI: 10.3390/ijerph19041961

As the executor of the River Chief System (RCS), local governments’ choice of implementation strategies directly affects the quality of regional water environment. The implementation of the RCS involves many interest subjects, and has gradually formed a game between enterprises’ sewage management and local governments’ RCS implementation strategies, and a game between the RCS implementation strategies of different local governments. The game behavior between the interested parties is long-term and dynamic in nature. Strategies such as reducing the cost of local governments’ implementation of the RCS and increasing the rate of sewage charges will lead to the evolution of the strategy set between enterprises’ treatment of sewage and local governments’ RCS implementation in the direction of {complete treatment of sewage, strictly enforcing the RCS}. Analysis of the evolutionary game model between the local governments reveals that strategies such as reducing the weight of economic indicators in local governments’ assessment, and increasing the material and spiritual rewards for implementing the RCS, will lead to the evolutionary game outcome of implementing the RCS between the local governments in the direction of {strictly enforcing the RCS, strictly enforcing the RCS}. The external effects of sewage discharge do not affect the evolution of the game system between the local governments.