Political Ideology and Green Innovation: Cross‐National Evidence and Asia‐Pacific Policy Implications

ABSTRACT

This article examines the relationship between political ideology and green innovation using an unbalanced panel of 131 countries from 1996 to 2020. Green innovation is proxied by environmental management patents, while political ideology is captured through the orientations of the chief executiveʼs party and the largest government party. Two‐way fixed‐effects estimates show that left‐leaning political orientations are associated with higher green patenting, whereas right‐leaning orientations are associated with lower green patenting. The association is stronger for air‐pollution abatement patents than for water‐pollution abatement patents and is more pronounced in more trade‐open, densely populated, and unequal economies. Robustness checks using alternative ideology measures, a value‐adjusted patent measure, and system generalised method of moments estimation support the main pattern. For Asia‐Pacific policymakers, the findings suggest the value of maintaining credible green innovation commitments across partisan changes, especially in trade‐oriented, densely populated, and unequal economies.