The sustainability cost of political crises: Do geopolitical risks affect the implementation of environmental policies?

The modern world faces several challenges in maintaining sustainability. Public decision-making often prioritizes self-centered interests, affecting the stringency of environmental policies. The significance of environmental policies in the complexities of this era remains underexplored in the literature. The present study keeping in view the dire need for stringent environmental policies intends to design a unique model that covers the major factors affecting the stringency of environmental policies today, like the geopolitical risk (GPR), economic growth (EG), resulting carbon emissions (CO₂), increasing technological innovations (TIN), and rapid urbanization (URB) hindering or boosting the efforts of sustainability. The study examines the G7 countries from 1990 to 2020 in this regard. The study adds to the Theory of Public Choice by extending the concept to environmental-related variables. The study applies the Panel Quantile Regression (PQR) technique to obtain results intensively. The inferences show that GPR and increasing carbon emissions hinder the enforcement of stringent environmental policies. Conversely, TIN, EG, and URB are making environmental policies more stringent. In light of study outcomes, the authors put forward practically viable policy implications which are considered helpful in securing SDG 13 (climate change), SDG 09 (innovations), SDG 11 (sustainable cities and societies), SDG 16 (strong institutions), SDG 08 (decent economic growth), and directly and several other SDGs indirectly.