THE POLITICS OF ROAD FUNDING: REMOTE ABORIGINAL COMMUNITIES AND FEDERALISM IN WESTERN AUSTRALIA

Abstract

Abstract: This paper illustrates how remote Aboriginal communities shape rural road classification and funding policies in three Western Australian shires. The Australian federal system is characterised by a complex range of commonwealth and state governmental agencies competing for political space within different localities. Because Aborigines are constituents of the commonwealth and the state, a distinction is drawn between local government political activity, and politics that occur within the locality of a shire. Success in influencing policy‐making processes throughout the federal system stems from the participants' ability to exploit the system. The Aboriginal impact on road policy‐making within remote localities is linked to electoral, bureaucratic, and sectional interest politics. These are features of governing and they provide a conceptual framework for the organisation of political activity by commonwealth, state, and local agencies, and Aboriginal communities.