加快形成新质生产力是构筑我国新竞争优势、赢得发展主动权的必由之路,制度创新在其中起着主导作用。作为制度改革的“试验田”,自贸区建设能否释放制度红利赋能企业新质生产力发展?文章基于2012—2022年中国A股上市公司的面板数据,使用交叠双重差分法实证分析了自贸区建设对企业新质生产力的影响及作用机制。研究发现:第一,自贸区建设能够赋能企业新质生产力发展,该结论经过一系列稳健性检验后仍然成立;第二,机制分析表明,自贸区建设通过缓解企业融资约束、促进企业数字化转型以及推进市场化程度赋能企业新质生产力发展;第三,异质性分析表明,在企业层面,自贸区对于推动非国企和小规模企业新质生产力发挥着更积极的作用;在行业层面,自贸区在高技术和非高污染行业对新质生产力的影响更为明显;在区域层面,自贸区在产业结构水平更优和更高知识产权保护程度的地区促进作用更为明显。本文的研究不仅为自贸区建设如何赋能企业新质生产力提供了系统性的实证分析,还为优化制度型开放、推动新质生产力高质量发展提供了有价值的政策启示。

Accelerating the formation of new quality productive forces is the essential path to building China's new competitive advantages and gaining development initiative, with institutional innovation playing a leading role in this process. Can the construction of free trade zones, as a "test ground" for institutional reform, unleash institutional dividends to empower the development of new quality productive forces in enterprises? Based on the panel data from Chinese A-share listed companies from 2012 to 2022, this study employed the staggered difference-in-differences (DID) method to empirically analyze the impact of free trade zones construction on enterprise new quality productive forces and its mechanisms. The findings revealed that: First, free trade zones construction can empower the development of enterprise new quality productive forces, and this conclusion remains robust after a series of rigorous tests; Second, the mechanism analysis showed that free trade zones construction empowers new quality productive forces of enterprises by alleviating financing constraints, promoting digital transformation, and advancing marketization; Third, the heterogeneity analysis indicated that, at the enterprise level, free trade zones play a more positive role in promoting new quality productive forces in non-state-owned and small-scale enterprises; at the industry level, the impact of free trade zones on new quality productive forces is more pronounced in high-tech and non-high-pollution industries; at the regional level, the promotion effect of free trade zones is more significant in regions with superior industrial structures and higher levels of intellectual property protection. This study has provided a systematic empirical analysis of how free trade zones construction facilitates enterprise new quality productive forces and it will offer valuable policy insights for optimizing institutional opening-up and fostering high-quality development of new quality productive forces.