Publication Summary
This thesis was submitted in 2003 as part of my economics degree. It examines welfare state restructuring across the developed world, and the trend towards governments redefining citizenship entitlements – from systems of entitlement to systems of conditionality and reciprocal obligation to the state. Within this examination, it primarily focuses upon consideration of a targeted package entitled ‘Australians Working Together’, intended to promote self-reliance amongst Indigenous Australians, and specifically, seeks to critique the likely impact of the Howard government’s welfare reform initiatives on Indigenous people within the distinct landscape of northern Australia. The hypothesis of the study was that the particular attributes and complexities of welfare provision in northern Australia would require considerable sensitivity to its uniqueness of place, if welfare reform was to reach any potential it might have in acting as an agent of change and empowerment for individuals and communities.