Australian Federalism and School Funding Arrangements: An Examination of Competing Models and Recurrent Critiques

Abstract

Australian federalism and school funding arrangements have transformed significantly over the last 30 years. There is now an unprecedented level of federal activity in state policy domains, especially education, resulting in highly complex and contested intergovernmental relations. Yet, there has been no rigorous academic analysis of federalism in relation to school funding arrangements, either from a political science or education perspective, and consequently, the nature and influence of federalism on school funding and policymaking is not understood. This paper draws together these disparate debates and examines how federalism affects school funding policies, reform and processes at the subnational level. It is based on a detailed study of the Victorian government’s ‘Schools of the Future’ reforms (1992-1999), which devolved 93 per cent of the state government’s public education budget to individual schools, effectively allowing schools to govern themselves within a state accountability framework. These reforms are described by supporters and detractors alike as the most radical Australian education reform in the last century. This paper explores the policy making process with reference to commonwealth and intergovernmental influences. It challenges recurrent critiques of Australian federalism, finding that SOTF best corresponds with the coordinate view of federalism, driven first and foremost by the Victorian government’s immediate political objectives and ideological principles, with minimal attention to federal processes, other Australian governments or intergovernmental agreements; and that institutional and fiscal arranges facilitated – rather than obstructed - policy innovation and transfer. It argues that federalism should be understood as a complex and dynamic system of processes and institutions, embedded in, and interacting with society. The study was based upon original data and documents from government and non-government bodies, complemented by interviews with key policy actors, triangulated against secondary literature, and analyzed qualitatively in conceptual frame drawing upon variants of institutionalism and Kingdon’s policy streams framework.