Commonwealth Non-Government School Funding Policies and Their Administration in Australia

Abstract

This thesis traces the efforts of successive Australian Commonwealth governments from Menzies to Howard to influence school education through its funding policies. It focuses on the means by which (allocational programs were decided, funding mechanisms were chosen, and the processes of issues emergence, authorisation, implementation and administration were developed. The major focus is on the funding policies for non-government schools and the major means by which successive governments sought to manage conflict over the issue. This work argues that no one single paradigm is capable of explaining the complex political processes of the last thirty five years. A corollary of social pluralism has been ideological diversity. Commonwealth governments since 1963 have appealed to a variety of political and social theories and discourses to unify the plurality of viewpoints and to transcend the particularism of sectional viewpoints. The period has been characterised by the pragmatic use of the political process and its attendant mechanisms to sublimate discord and permit successive governments to promote their own vision of a just society and seek their own political advantage. Each of the solutions has not survived the government's term of office without modification. A number of perennial themes are identified. These include: the implications for policy making of an increasingly diverse Australian society; the range of competing ideological approaches; Commonwealth-state relations; the availability of budgeted funding; the impact of public sector management reforms; the roles of industrial and other pressure groups; and the continuing attempt to manage political conflict.