Environmental Degradation and Public Opinion: The Case of Air Pollution in Vietnam

• Author: S. P. Harish,Xiaomeng Jin,Sung Eun Kim,Johannes Urpelainen,Ryan Kennedy
• DOI: 10.1177/1070496519888252
• Date: 01 June 2020
• Published date: 01 June 2020
• Subject Matter: Articles

Article

Environmental

Degradation and Public

Opinion: The Case of

Air Pollution in Vietnam

Sung Eun Kim

1

, S. P. Harish

2

,

Ryan Kennedy

3

, Xiaomeng Jin

4

, and

Johannes Urpelainen

5

Abstract

Air pollution is a pressing problem of public health for developing countries, but

governments have few incentives to abate air pollution without public awareness of

the issue. Focusing on the case of Vietnam, we examine the determinants of public

awareness of air pollution. Using representative survey data for the entire country

from 2017, we find that local exposure to air pollution increases public awareness

and reduces satisfaction with governments but does not provoke opposition to coal-

fired power generation. In contrast, education leads people to oppose coal-fired

power plants. These results suggest that while local air pollution contributes to

awareness and dissatisfaction with the government, support for effective policy

measures depends on education levels.

Keywords

air pollution, public opinion, Southeast Asia, education, Vietnam

1

Korea University, Seoul, Republic of Korea

2

College of William and Mary, Williamsburg, VA, USA

3

University of Houston, TX, USA

4

Columbia University, New York, NY, USA

5

Johns Hopkins University Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, Washington, DC, USA

Corresponding Author:

Sung Eun Kim, Korea University, 145 Anam-ro, Seongbuk-gu, Seoul 02841, Republic of Korea.

Email: sung_kim@korea.edu

Journal of Environment &

Development

2020, Vol. 29(2) 196–222

!The Author(s) 2019

Article reuse guidelines:

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DOI: 10.1177/1070496519888252

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Air pollution is a serious threat to public health and the environment

(Nel, 2005). The problem is particularly severe in developing countries, with

more than 90% of air pollution-related deaths occurring in low- and middle-

income countries (World Health Organization, 2018). The problem is expected

to worsen in the future. In Southeast Asia, for example, emissions from coal are

expected to increase threefold by 2030 at current rate (Koplitz, Jacob, Sulprizio,

Myllyvirta, & Reid, 2017). From a political perspective, governments can

choose to promote clean energy and reduce emissions, but such initiatives

require support from the public (Wu

¨stenhagen, Wolsink, & Bu

¨rer, 2007).

Public demand for action against air pollution is more likely when the public is

aware of the problem, understands that it can be addressed with government

actions, and is willing to hold elected off‌icials accountable. Political scientists

have found that public awareness of environmental problems f‌luctuates consider-

ably (Brulle, Carmichael, & Jenkins, 2012; Downs, 1972; Dunlap, 2013) and that

citizens have diff‌iculty distinguishing between natural and man-made problems

(Achen & Bartels, 2016). Furthermore, holding governments accountable for spe-

cif‌ic policy issues is diff‌icult in both democratic and authoritarian settings

(Ashworth, 2012; Healy & Lenz, 2014). That said, Alkon and Wang (2018) reveal

that air pollution in Beijing does contribute to dissatisfaction with the government,

suggesting that under some conditions people respond to worsening air quality.

We explore the factors thatrelate to awareness in the case of Vietnam. Vietnam

was ranked as 161 out of 180 countries in the air pollution category of the 2018

Environmental Performance Index (Wendling, Emerson, Esty, Levy, & de

Sherbinin, 2018). Among Southeast Asian countries, Vietnam is expected to be

most affected by pollution due to coal plant emissions, with 188.8 excess deaths

per million people by 2030 (Koplitz et al., 2017). Vietnam plans to increase the

amount of generated electricity from renewable sources, but such initiatives are

colored by the fact that the country is also planning to build 26 additional coal

power plants after 2020 (VnExpress International, 2018).

We begin by examining the determinants of individuals’ awareness about air

pollution and their opposition to coal-f‌ired power plants inVietnam. In exploring

these two dimensions, we focus on (a) the degree of exposure to air pollution and

(b) the role of education. We expect local air quality to be an important deter-

minant of one’s perception about air pollution. Yet, its effects on opposition to

coal are unclear as individual citizens may not associate such plants with air

pollution. However, we expect that individuals with higher education would be

more aware of air pollution and more opposed to coal plants. We further explore

whether exposure to air pollution lowers satisfaction with the government.

To test our expectations, we combine our ward-level estimates of air pollu-

tion and public opinion data from the 2017 Vietnam Provincial Governance and

Public Administration Performance Index (PAPI) (UNDP, CECODES and

VFF, 2017a,b). We use two indicators for ward-level air pollution. First, we

use satellite measures of an important air pollutant, nitrogen dioxide (NO

2

)as

Kim et al. 197