Free trade zones (FTZ) are designated areas for promoting trade openness and investment facilitation. In China, FTZs are also regarded as “green areas” in which planning actions and institutional innovations are implemented, and there is a commitment to promoting urban green and healthy development. Given that green total factor productivity (GTFP) is an important measure of a city’s health and green performance, this study exploits the difference-in-differences method to explore the impact of pilot FTZs on urban GTFP in 280 cities in China for the period between 2005 and 2017. The results show that the green areas positively contributed to the growth of GTFP. Moreover, the outcome holds with robustness tests. Statistically, the positive effect emerged in cities during the first three years after introducing the initiative, with the effect disappearing afterward. It also had a strong positive impact in the central and western regions and in large and medium-sized cities, while the influence remained insignificant in the remaining areas in China. Furthermore, the paper also reveals that the promotion of foreign direct investment and industrial structure upgrading are the primary channels through which the positive relationship between pilot FTZs and GTFP is established.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is increasingly employed to support decision-making in the public sector, yet it exacerbates the “problem of many hands and eyes” in public accountability. Using a vignette experiment with a 3 × 3 factorial design, we investigated how the configuration of account givers and holders in AI accountability affects perceived legitimacy among citizens. Our findings indicate that human agents are perceived as more legitimate account holders than AI systems, where bureaucratic operators outperform technological developers. Additionally, citizens are perceived as more legitimate account holders than political leaders and experts. We also explored the interactive effects between account givers and holders. This study responds to calls for empirical evidence on AI accountability, expands the conceptual framework of accountability in the AI era, and highlights the crucial roles of bureaucrats and citizens.

The international community has reached a consensus on preventing the global climate from deterioration. As the country with the largest carbon dioxide emissions, China has made a commitment to such prevention. Free trade zone (FTZ) established in 2013 is a designated area planned for promoting trade openness and investment facilitation. More importantly, it is a policy experiment aimed at establishing a green and low-carbon development model. Based on province-level data of China for the period 1997-2017, this study exploits the synthetic control method to explore the impact of FTZ policy on carbon dioxide emissions. The results show that, compared with the synthetic control regions, the carbon dioxide emission of the Shanghai FTZ has reduced by about 10% after the implementation of the FTZ policy. Moreover, the outcome holds with placebo tests and sensitivity analysis. Employing the difference-in-differences method, the results also demonstrate FTZ policy substantially reduces carbon dioxide emissions. Our findings provide institutional enlightenments for China and other developing countries to balance economic development and environmental protection with opening to the outside world.