Abstract: With the continuous evolution of the global value chain (GVC) over time,China’s strategic emerging industries have been deeply embedded in the global value chain.By integrating into global innovation networks,strategic emerging industries achieve continuous evolution and development.Under the current pressure of green transformation,it has become inevitable to cultivate and develop green and environmentally friendly strategic emerging industries.Hence,as the global division of labor becomes more pronounced,the integration of China’s strategic emerging industries into the GVC will undeniably influence their green technological innovation.However,there is still little literature linking the green technology innovation of enterprises with the GVC participation of their industries.Given that enterprises are the main subjects of green transformation implementation,we argue that it is necessary to focus on enterprise green technology innovation.In addition,few studies have considered the unique characteristics and strategic significance of strategic emerging industries when examining corporate green technology innovation within these industries.
Based on data from 1476 samples of Chinese strategic emerging industries,this paper constructs a fixed-effects model using enterprise data.We explore the influence mechanism of GVC participation in Chinese strategic emerging industries on firms’ green technology innovation.The results reveal that： ① the GVC participation position of strategic emerging industries significantly and positively affects the green technology innovation performance of enterprises; ② backward participation plays a negative mediating utility in the GVC participation position and enterprises’ green technology innovation;  ③ the regional macroeconomic level positively regulates the relationship between GVC participation position and green technology innovation.
According to the above research results,this paper gets the following insights.First,the government must recognize the importance of the industry’s GVC embedding status for enterprises’ green technology innovation,and actively promote the development of strategic emerging industries.Secondly,the development of green technology cannot be separated from economic support.Therefore,the government can combine the development of traditional industries and strategic emerging industries,using new technologies to empower traditional industries to achieve economic growth.At the same time,the government can also formulate multi-stage and multi-type policies to encourage the re-research and development of green technology innovation.Third,enterprises should maintain an aggressive attitude when participating in the global division of labor.Enterprises should establish a network of trustworthy relationships with other enterprises,strengthen their sense of independent innovation,and learn in the process of cooperation.By strengthening enterprises’ sense of independent innovation and learning,we can promote the benign development of the industry from the enterprise perspective and get rid of the dilemma of being trapped at the bottom of the value chain.
This paper enriches the study of economic transformation of strategic emerging industries from the enterprise perspective.It not only provides a new perspective for the study of value chain theory and green technology innovation,but also provides theoretical reference and guidance for the practice of green innovation in other industries.