Colonial logics in contemporary governance: The role of outsourcing in Indigenous affairs

This paper explores the ways in which Indigenous Peoples’ right to self‐determination is undermined through government outsourcing processes in Indigenous affairs in Australia. These processes, which are themselves based on settler colonial interpretations of ‘independence’ and ‘efficiency’ that are naturalised within the state, work to deny First Peoples’ governance of their own futures. This paper explores the ways in which outsourcing is used to inhibit Indigenous Peoples’ collective self‐determination, both as land‐based political entities and as service delivery organisations with policy expertise. The rise of New Public Management (NPM) in Australia through the 1980s and 1990s transformed the relationship between service delivery organisations and government more broadly. Subsequently, championed by a conservative Howard government, the early 2000s saw a particular intensification of NPM in Indigenous affairs. As a result, Indigenous community organisations have experienced a deeply politicised and racialised version of these changes. The privatisation of public infrastructure has been a central pillar of NPM, but with that has travelled the privatisation of policy expertise. We argue that outsourcing policy expertise evokes a narrative of impartiality and cost‐efficiency that helps government cut through the political noise of failure and crisis in Indigenous affairs. Enlisting entities like large management consulting companies to conduct policy research and develop policy advice creates both a sense that the work is done at arm's length from governments and that it is delivered in a more cost‐effective way than government can deliver it. Outsourcing policy research and advice can be understood as part of the larger project of privatisation, which enables not only asset stripping of the public sector but also ‘expertise stripping’ that moves governance of Indigenous affairs even further away from Indigenous Peoples. We argue that the privatisation of policy research on Indigenous issues functions to normalise market values that are then used to further alienate Indigenous People from their ancestral lands and invalidate Indigenous policy expertise. Points for practitioners Privatisation and outsourcing in Indigenous affairs is often understood by public servants as a neutral and efficient process, but it is not and has had negative political, social, and policy effects. Outsourcing as currently operating has maintained government control of policy and programmes, while putting the burden of compliance and outcomes on Indigenous community organisations. It has also resulted in funding insecurity and the defunding of this crucial sector. Given the loss of policy expertise in government agencies, block grant funding or other mechanisms should be used to allow policy decision‐making within, and funding control by, Indigenous community organisations. Indigenous community organisations juggle competing accountabilities to governments and to their communities. Government should shift its approach to support these organisations to meet community accountabilities, instead of burdening them with excessive administrative and financial requirements.