Does digital government reduce carbon emissions? Empirical evidence from global sources

Carbon emissions have become a common concern of the international community. We investigate the stage differences in the impact of digital government on carbon emissions from a life cycle perspective of digital government development through nonlinear modeling based on data from 159 countries from 2003 to 2022. Our research found that: (1) Digital government has a non-linear effect on carbon emissions in an inverted "U" shape of "first promote and then inhibit", with an inflection point value of 0.328. Digital government can significantly inhibit carbon emissions when it exceeds the inflection point value. Mechanism analysis shows that digital government has a suppressing effect on carbon emissions by improving government efficiency, government regulatory quality, and business environment. In addition, this inverted "U" relationship is more pronounced in developed countries and countries with outward-looking economies. (2) Among the components of digital government, information infrastructure and online services are the key drivers of this inverted "U" relationship. Threshold analysis shows that when the information infrastructure index exceeds 0.437 or the online service index exceeds 0.606, the digital government shows a significant inhibition of carbon emissions. (3) Moderation analysis shows that energy consumption structure, employment structure, and e-participation of residents negatively moderated the inverted U-shaped relationship between digital government and carbon emissions, and they flattened the original inverted U-shaped curve. We then make some policy recommendations for different types of countries in their efforts to sustainably scale up government.