The Impact of Good Governance on Environmental Pollution in South-West Asian Countries

Over the past few decades, good governance has become an important issue in public administration. One key reason behind this reality is the paramount role of government in promoting sustainable development and protecting the environment. Therefore, evaluating the impact of good governance on the quality of the environment could be taken into consideration by both the economic researchers and the policy makers. This paper dealt with the impact of good governance on the environmental pollution in Iran and its competitors in the 2025 vision document (i.e. south-west Asian countries, SWAC) over the period of 2002 to 2015. The results revealed that accountability, political stability government effectiveness, quality of law, rule of law and control of corruption (as representative indicators of good governance) has significant effects on the environmental pollution. The degree of the economic openness does indicate negative and significant relations with the environmental pollution as well. The paper suggests that economic growth and value added industry have a significant positive effect on environmental pollution in the countries studied. Therefore, improving good governance indices in selected countries including Iran could potentially reduce the pollution.