The Mirage of Municipal Self-Sufficiency: a taxonomic approach to local government sustainability in Australia

The long-run sustainability of Australian local councils has come under intense scrutiny over the past few years. Two reports from the Commonwealth, several state-based local government inquiries, a national commissioned report, an embryonic but growing academic literature and numerous conferences by peak local government bodies all attest to deep misgivings over the current condition of Australian local government. Various approaches to the analysis of local government sustainability have been developed, most of which focus heavily on the financial dimensions of the problem. This has led to a plethora of putative policy solutions to the problem. This paper provides a synoptic review of previous work in the area and advances a typology of local government sustainability as a potentially useful analytical tool for conceptualizing the problem of local government sustainability.