Environmental Challenges and Political Regime Transition: The Role of Historical Legacies and the European Union in Eurasia

This paper addresses the impact of political regimes on carbon emissions (CO2) from a historical perspective, covering period 1970–2015. Our sample consists 153 countries that we follow for 20 years before transition (1970–1990) and 26 after it (1990–2015). During transition, post-Communist states experienced decline in CO2, when controlling economic variables. Transition had positive environment only cases was associated with democratization. When has led to consolidation autocratic regimes, CO2 increased.