Environmental regulations bring social benefits and contribute to lessening environmental damage. At the same time, due to the rapidly changing and complex environmental legislation, businesses incur costs, including administrative burdens. The article presents quantitative evidence on the factors that affect the compliance costs of environmental regulations. For this purpose, we used a binary model of logistic regression with the following predictors: enterprise characteristics, the relevance of environmental regulations for business operations, and the impact of environmental stimulus measures on compliance costs. The results of the study suggest that medium-sized enterprises are less likely to experience the environmental administrative burden than small enterprises. However, no difference has been found between large and small enterprises. Further, we show that environmental consents are an important determinant of the environmental administrative burden and that financial environmental measures can have a positive impact thereon.

This paper analyses the role and significance of the selected factors for the successful design and implementation of public policies in Slovenia and more broadly. Based on structured interviews and content analysis of the responses, we investigated the impact of predefined factors (i.e. strategic, institutional, normative, economic/financial, methodological/procedural, organisational/human resources/ICT support factors). The aim of the article is to analyse the case of Slovenia, to identify which factors contribute most to the successful design and implementation of public policies, and to provide a basis for comparison with similar countries or systems. The research findings imply several conclusions, particularly strategic factors, which have been identified as the most essential. The other findings are related to the lack of evaluation practice, the discontinuity of and early changes in government, which affect all aspects of policy execution and lead to poor intersectoral collaboration as well as insufficient and ineffective public debate. Not surprisingly, all of the identified hindrances are featured in the pertinent theories as necessary democratic dimensions of contemporary public governance. Contrary to the national context, the EU influence seems to expedite policymaking processes and contribute to the consistency of policies.

Purpose: The aim of the paper is to identify potential factors that influence the relative size of environmental compliance costs through a literature review and propose a conceptual holistic model of the indirect impact of these factors on companies’ productivity levels. In the literature, the connection between costs associated with environmental regulation and companies’ productivity has been thoroughly tested within what is known as the Porter hypothesis, or simply PH.Design/methodology/approach: The paper applies the methods of integrative review of scientific literature and qualitative research with a document study.Findings: The results point to several key findings. First, the identified potential factors can be divided into two main categories, namely internal factors (size, sector, age, environmental awareness, etc.) and external factors (relevance of environmental regulation for businesses, environmental stimulus measures, quality of institutions, etc.). Second, the wide use of compliance costs within the indicators of stringency of environmental regulation suggests that the relative size of environmental compliance costs is likely to affect companies’ productivity.Practical Implications: The identification of factors affecting the size of compliance costs provides valuable insights to policy makers for the implementation of environmental regulation and making it more effective while not being discriminatory in terms of presenting an excessive burden to certain types of companies.Originality/significance: There has been a gap in the literature on environmental regulation compliance costs, as so far no study has comprehensively addressed all the potential factors influencing the relative size of environmental compliance costs for companies.

More than three decades after its introduction, the Porter Hypothesis (PH), which argues that well-designed environmental regulation can stimulate innovation and even enhance productivity, remains highly relevant. This study presents the first comprehensive review integrating bibliometric and qualitative content analysis, offering a systematic and current overview of the field and identifying how research themes, methods, and empirical focus have evolved over time. First, bibliometric analysis examines 800 PH-related articles (1991-2024), comparing developments across an early (1991-2013) and a later (2014-2024) period. The analysis reveals a marked increase in publication activity, methodological advancement, and policy relevance in the past decade, especially in China. Second, the qualitative content analysis of the 15 most influential studies confirms strong support for the weak version of the PH and conditional support for the strong version, particularly under flexible, market-based regimes. The findings also show a shift from theory-driven toward empirically grounded research, employing advanced econometric techniques and broader indicators that increasingly integrate green dimensions (e.g., green innovation, green total factor productivity, sustainable development). Third, based on the identified research trends and knowledge gaps, the study highlights that smart and context sensitive regulatory frameworks, integrating market-based instruments, innovation incentives and regional differentiation, can effectively align environmental protection with sustainable economic performance. Overall, the study maps the evolution of PH research, outlines directions for future inquiry and environmental policy, and aims to serve as a reference point for scholars seeking to further advance the theoretical and empirical development of the PH.

Public administration (PA) as a discipline and public governance as a closely related concept have been developing constantly and rather rapidly in recent years. A particularly lively progress is characteristic of Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), owing to its post-communist legacy and subsequent transition. This paper outlines the mainstream topics of PA development within The NISPAcee Journal , which covers the CEE region and beyond. The principal objective of the paper is to systematically and quantitatively codify a series of text documents that comprises 142 articles published between 2008 and 2016 in The NISPAcee Journal , in order to identify the characteristics of PA development in the region. The paper investigates three hypotheses: first, whether the quality of the articles changed throughout 2008 – 2016; second, whether The NISPAcee Journal attests a multidisciplinary orientation in terms of scientific contributions from different disciplines, and third, whether The NISPAcee Journal reflects the West-East knowledge transfer among PA academia. The three hypotheses were tested against seven analytical dimensions. The research findings reveal that governance is the prevailing cognitive paradigmatic approach of The NISPAcee Journal . Europeanisation is the common thread of almost all articles, with a particular emphasis on the ideological elements of the Neo-Weberian and New Public Management doctrines. Qualitative methodology is still the prevailing research method, and the occurrence of mixed methodology is rare. The topical orientation of the analysed manuscripts is very diverse. A considerable emphasis is placed on the analysis and development of PA as a discipline. The majority of researchers originate from CEE countries and focus their studies on Eastern Europe, the Balkans, and the Caucasus. Scientific partnership between the Eastern and the Western academic worlds is still scarce. Given the low level of exchange of best academic practices between Western and Eastern Europe, research results indicate the need for an increased internationalisation of the NISPAcee Journal and a more holistic approach to tackle the future challenges of global and regional PA and public governance more adequately.

Sustainable societies of the future should be designed on the basis of a green public budgeting, as green public 79 spending and investment are the key drivers of sustainable development. Studies on green budgeting have so far tended to focus on gree...