Local state financialisation: future research directions for an emergent conjuncture

Abstract

Amidst profound geopolitical and economic instability, local states endure as loci of governance accountability providing critical infrastructures and essential local services. This paper sets out a research agenda on local states and financialisation for this changing conjuncture, emphasising the importance of the statecraft of actors at different geographical scales. We identify issues around six key themes for research on local states and financialisation: 'statecraft and conjunctural analysis', 'austerity urbanism', 'state restructuring', 'local states as risk managers', '(re)organisation and ownership' and 'decentring the Global North'. Across these themes, we argue for a renewed, globally-informed focus on statecraft in the remaking of fiscal geographies in research on local states and their financing. In a period of profound change, we highlight that municipal finance is a central component of the finance-space nexus through which fiscal geographies are transformed and transformative.