Local Economic Development (LED) has increasingly emerged as an important policy imperative for local communities globally. The growing emphasis on LED has found particular traction in South Africa since 1994, as policymakers and local communities have grappled with how to address the twin challenges of redressing historical imbalances in service delivery as a result of apartheid with South Africa's increasing exposure to global macroeconomic factors. The LED literature emphasises the role of strategic management in LED planning, but a tension exists between a strategic management orientated approach to LED and a participatory model of local development, especially because strategic management is a concept developed for business. This article explores the concept of strategic management and interrogates its relevance to LED. Several structural challenges are identified that call into question an uncritical application of strategi