自2013年党的十八大以来，党中央对于反腐工作的重视程度提升到了前所未有的高度，一方面，深入且持续的反腐败斗争和党风廉政建设是全面从严治党、营建风清气正政治氛围的有力抓手，在过去的十年间取得了显著成效；另一方面，腐败和反腐败除作为社会现象和政治要素，更是营商环境、经济环境的重要组成部分，在企业的良性竞争和发展中发挥着关键调节作用。设租和寻租不仅对企业短期业务开展和财务绩效构成影响，更在无形中冲击着企业的可持续发展能力，而这集中反映在企业的ESG绩效上。本文从这一宏观背景和创新思路出发，通过搜集2013至2021年全部A股上市公司的相关数据，以管理费用下二级科目招待费作为腐败的被动指征，采用“招待费用率”作为企业所面临外部腐败水平的测量，研究了腐败对企业ESG绩效的影响。研究显示，这一腐败测量手段具备充分有效性，和各国际组织采取主观评价法所得的整体指数变化趋势高度一致；而腐败确实对企业的ESG绩效表现具有显著负面作用。为避免因测量误差和ESG评级体系差异化等因素造成的干扰，本文对有关变量采取多种放宽和替换措施，确保了结论的稳健性。同时，为在一定程度上解决内生性问题，本文采用工具变量做了对应尝试，验证了结论的可靠性。在此基础上，本文进一步展开异质性分析和机制检验，有效拓宽视角、挖掘深度，就腐败对企业ESG绩效表现的具体影响机制展开讨论，以增强结论丰厚程度，形成最终研究结论和建议。本文最大的创新点和最重要启示意义在于：（1）揭示腐败对企业ESG绩效和可持续发展能力的负面影响，提出反腐败斗争对国有企业高质量发展及地区协调发展均具有积极价值，为国家反腐行动的经济意义提供理论支撑；（2）明确腐败通过特权保护作用和投资挤出效应这两条重要路径产生影响，验证了寻租理论和交易成本理论揭示的对应机制。
Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China (CPC) in 2013, the attention of the CPC Central Committee to anti-corruption work has increased to an unprecedented level. On the one hand, the in-depth and sustained anti-corruption campaign and Party building work are powerful tools for creating a clean and upright political atmosphere, which have achieved significant results in the past decade; On the other hand, corruption and anti-corruption, as social phenomena and political elements, are also important components of the business and economic environment, playing a key regulatory role in the healthy competition and development of enterprises. Renting and rent-seeking not only have an impact on short-term business operations and financial performance of enterprises, but also have an intangible impact on their sustainable development ability, which is reflected in their ESG performance.Starting from this macro background and innovative approach, this article collects relevant data of all A-share listed companies from 2013 to 2021, using the second level subject of management expenses, entertainment expenses, as a passive indicator of corruption, and using the "entertainment expense rate" as a measure of the external corruption level faced by enterprises, to study the impact of corruption on ESG performance of enterprises. Research has shown that this corruption measurement method is fully effective and highly consistent with the overall trend of index changes obtained by various international organizations using subjective evaluation methods; Corruption does have a significant negative impact on the ESG performance of enterprises. In order to avoid the interference caused by measurement error and ESG rating system differentiation, this paper takes a variety of relaxation and replacement measures for relevant variables to ensure the robustness of the conclusions. At the same time, in order to solve the endogeneity problem to a certain extent, this article uses the instrumental variable to make corresponding attempts and verify the reliability of the conclusion. On this basis, this article further conducts heterogeneity analysis and mechanism testing, effectively broadening perspectives and exploring depth, and discussing the specific impact mechanism of corruption on ESG performance of enterprises, which enhance the richness of conclusions and form the final research conclusions and recommendations.The biggest innovation and significance of this article lies in: (1) revealing the negative impact of corruption on the ESG performance and sustainable development ability of enterprises, proposing that the anti-corruption campaign has positive value for the high-quality development of state-owned enterprises and regional coordinated development, and providing theoretical support for the economic significance of national anti-corruption actions; (2) clarifying that corruption has an impact through two important paths: privilege protection and investment crowding-out effect, validates the corresponding mechanisms revealed by rent-seeking theory and transaction cost theory.
