Public participation is playing an increasingly important role in the process of environmental protection, especially in some developing countries such as China. However, the studies that have focused on public participation in air pollution control, especially those that have used quantitative research, are comparatively insufficient in China. This paper investigated residents’ participation intention and behavior in air pollution control in Beijing, China, and related the theory of planned behavior and the concepts of risk perception to analyze the formation mechanism of participation behavior. The results indicated a remarkable discrepancy between participation intention and behavior. Subjective norm was the major factor in predicting participation intention, followed by risk perception and attitude. Income was observed to have a negative effect on participation intention and a positive effect on participation behavior.

Particulate air pollution is a serious problem and has received extensive attention in Beijing. The public might amplify the health risks because of the visibility and frequency of haze, potentially leading to anxiety and panic. Public risk perception might affect individual behaviors and their willingness to pay for improving air quality. We used contingent valuation method and psychometric paradigm to investigate public risk perception and elicit willingness to pay for reductions in the health risk posed by fine particulate matter 2.5 smaller than 2.5 microns in width in Beijing, China. The logit model results showed that the level of fear and four characteristics of risk perception—familiarity, scope of impact, relevance to individual, and voluntariness—had significant effects on respondents’ payment decision. The ordinary least squares model results showed the level of anxiety, anger, and satisfaction about the current situation and four characteristics of risk perception—scope of impact, overall risk, duration of effects, and controllability—had significant effects on the amount of willingness to pay.

With the deepening of government reform, the Chinese government has strengthened the functions of public service and social management. Public policies are increasingly concerned with residents’ well-being. However, environmental quality, which can be regarded as a visual indicator to reflect the performance of environmental protection and the quality of public service, is still not optimistic in China. Thus, we wonder if there exist deep relationships among public expenditure, environmental pollution, and subjective well-being. By combining the data from the Chinese Family Panel Survey (CFPS) with relevant government statistics, we find that public expenditure improves residents’ well-being, whereas environmental pollution has a negative effect. More importantly, environmental pollution is found to moderate the relationship between government expenditure and residents’ subjective well-being. These findings not only prove the extra costs of environmental degradation, but also suggest that good performance of environmental governance should be emphasized in promoting human welfare.

This paper examines the causes and process of return migration from the coastal region to the inland provinces in China since the early 2010s, based on the case study of Zhumadian city in Henan Province. Surveys administered to both rural migrants from Zhumadian to Shenzhen and recent returnees to Zhumadian are presented. Industrial relocation and the development of inland provinces trigger the current wave of return migration. Family obligations, better prospects of the hometown, and barriers to settle in Shenzhen because of the hukou system are the principal reasons to return. Most of the migrants return to work in a factory or start a business. Some migrants purchase apartments in Zhumadian as a prelude to returning and starting a business at a future date. Returnees prefer settling down in urban areas rather than in their rural origins. In light of the empirical findings, the authors argue that return migration will ease the mismatch of labor supply and demand between the inland and coastal provinces, such that the Lewis Turning Point has not been reached yet. The continuing process of rural migrants returning to and settling down in Zhumadian suggests a way to achieve some of the goals in China’s new-type urbanization plan, as local governments may address the two major challenges of the plan, namely, local job creation and financing for increased demand for public services.