In law, an unincorporated area is a region of land that is not governed by a local

municipal corporation; similarly an unincorporated community is a settlement that

is not governed by its own local municipal corporation, but rather is administered
as part of larger administrative divisions, such as a township, parish, borough,
county, city, canton, state, province or country. Occasionally, municipalities
dissolve or disincorporate, which may happen if they become fiscally insolvent, and
services become the responsibility of a higher administration. Widespread
unincorporated communities and areas are a distinguishing feature of the United
States and Canada. In most other countries of the world, there are either no
unincorporated areas at all, or these are very rare; typically remote, outlying,
sparsely populated or uninhabited areas.

By country
Australia
Unlike many other countries, Australia has only one level of local government
immediately beneath state and territorial governments. A local government area
(LGA) often contains several towns and even entire cities. Thus, aside from very
sparsely populated areas and a few other special cases, almost all of Australia is
part of an LGA. Unincorporated areas are often in remote locations, cover vast
areas or have very small populations.

Postal addresses in unincorporated areas, as in other parts of Australia, normally

use the suburb or locality names gazetted by the relevant state or territorial
government. Thus, there is rarely any ambiguity regarding addresses in
unincorporated areas.

Australian Capital Territory

The Australian Capital Territory has no municipalities and is in some sense an
unincorporated area. The territorial government is directly responsible for matters
normally carried out by local government.

New South Wales

The far west and north of New South Wales constitutes the Unincorporated Far West
Region, which is sparsely populated and barely warrants an elected council. A civil
servant in the state capital manages such matters as are necessary. The second
unincorporated area of this state is Lord Howe Island.

Northern Territory