How does political instability affect renewable energy innovation?

This paper investigates how political instability affects the development of renewable energy innovation (REI) through empirical analysis of cross-country data from 60 countries over the period of 2002–2020. The results show that political instability has a negative impact on renewable energy innovation, particularly in countries with a robust renewable energy technology base. Specifically, every single type of renewable energy technology has decreased in response to political instability, with wind and solar being the most affected. We also find the non-linearity of such impact with different levels of government corruption, democracy, and military expenditure based on the threshold effect analysis. Therefore, governance quality matters when confronting political instability. Further analysis indicates that economic growth, technological development, and public R&D for renewable energy technologies are the mediating channels. These results provide significant policy implications and a better understanding of national innovation activities in renewable energy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]