Same neighborhood, different green intentions: the effect of hukou origin on Chinese citizens’ pro-environmental behaviors

Abstract Environmental governance is a critical component establishing sustainable ecosystems during urbanization. However, environmental self-governance in urban communities often faces challenges from population diversification. In China's urbanization process, the evolving demographic policies have facilitated large-scale migration from rural to urban areas, granting migrants with equal citizenship status and shared neighborhood environments, while environmentally relevant disparities could still root in early-life social origins, and continue to undermine the effectiveness of environmental governance. Using micro-level survey data from the China General Social Survey (CGSS), this study examines whether early-life hukou status influences urban residents' pro-environmental behaviors (PEBs), and discuss PEBs in public and private sphere. We explore the psychological mechanisms of environmental values, ecological awareness, and social connectedness. The results indicate that residents with rural hukou origin participate more frequently in individual-level environmental activities such as donations, protests, and petitions compared to urban natives, while demonstrating lower engagement in collective environmental actions, particularly organizational membership. Contrary to expectations, this behavioral divergence does not stem from differences in environmental values, but mainly through two mediating pathways of attenuated place attachment and ascription of responsibility. Our findings demonstrate that rural origins weaken residents' local social ties and alter their responsibility attribution patterns regarding environmental public goods. We reveal significant gaps in community participation between policy-driven hukou converters and urban natives. Besides, longer urban residence and local education exposure both can attenuate rural-urban PEB disparities. The findings of this study offer critical insights for constructing environmental governance systems during urbanization, highlighting population integration as a key challenge for community-based environmental self-governance in contemporary China.