Does corporate participation in rural revitalization improve carbon performance? Evidence fromknowledge resource integration and green innovation

Purpose In the context of China’s “dual carbon” goals and the rural revitalization strategy, whether corporate social participation can translate into environmental benefits remains a critical yet underexplored question. Drawing on the knowledge-based view and organizational learning theory, this study aims to investigate whether and how corporate participation in rural revitalization improves corporate carbon performance. It further explores the mediating mechanisms of green innovation and financing constraint alleviation, as well as the moderating role of internal governance characteristics and external institutional environments. Design/methodology/approach This study utilizes a panel dataset of Chinese A-share listed firms from 2016 to 2021, comprising 1,016 listed companies and 5,513 unbalanced panel observations. Corporate carbon performance is measured using industry-level carbon emission data from the CEADs database, and rural revitalization participation is captured by both the logarithm of poverty alleviation fund investments and a dummy variable indicating whether a firm participates in rural revitalization. Fixed-effects models are employed to test the hypotheses, and a series of robustness checks – including replacing the dependent variable, propensity score matching (PSM), excluding carbon trading pilot cities and excluding municipalities directly under the central government – are conducted to address potential endogeneity concerns. Mediating effect models with bias-corrected bootstrap analysis (5,000 resamples) are used to examine the roles of green innovation and financing constraints. Heterogeneity analyses are further performed based on political connections, regional economic development levels and public environmental awareness. Findings The results show that corporate participation in rural revitalization significantly improves carbon performance. Mechanism analyses reveal that firms involved in rural revitalization are better able to acquire external knowledge resources, alleviate financing constraints and promote green innovation activities, thereby enhancing carbon performance. Specifically, green innovation and financing constraint alleviation serve as important partial mediating channels. Further heterogeneity analysis indicates that the positive effect is more pronounced among firms with politically connected executives, firms located in economically developed regions and firms facing higher public environmental scrutiny. Originality/value This study enriches the literature on corporate social responsibility and carbon management by integrating the knowledge-based view and organizational learning theory into the rural revitalization context. It provides novel empirical evidence on how rural revitalization participation drives low-carbon transformation through knowledge resource integration and green innovation, offering practical implications for policymakers and corporate managers seeking to achieve sustainable development and carbon reduction objectives.