Author: UNDP
Site of publication: undp.org/Ghana
Type of publication: Policy brief
Date of publication: December 2021
Ghana’s progress towards Governance, Politics and Human Rights priorities
Ghana has been justifiably hailed as an oasis of peace and a role model for democratic governance in Africa despite being in a sub-region that in the past has been plagued by civil wars and political instability. Ghana’s democratic foundations have grown for over two decades as the country experienced eight consecutive elections without slipping into nationwide violence. Since 2001, there have also been three peaceful transfers of power between Ghana’s two dominant political parties, the current ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP) and the National Democratic Congress (NDC) – the main opposition party. This makes Ghana rather unique in the African context, as most African countries since the proliferation of multiparty elections in the early 1990s have experienced some form of electoral violence.
Ghana remains a top performer on various governance rankings in Africa. Evidence from the World Governance Indicators (WGI) suggests that within the context of sub-Saharan Africa, Ghana has long remained an above-average performer across most dimensions of governance, ranging from the exercise of voice and accountability to overall government effectiveness. Equally, in the most recent Ibrahim Index on African Governance (IIAG), Ghana ranked 1st in freedom of association and assembly, 3rd in personal liberties, 4th in accountability and transparency, and 8th in overall governance.
Ghana’s Key Governance Deficits and Risks
Weak state capacity
Although Ghana is justifiably hailed as a democratic success story in Africa, overtime most state institutions remain incapacitated and ineffective in delivering on their mandated functions , as evidenced in widespread citizens’ dissatisfaction with the delivery of public goods at both the national and sub-national levels. The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) recently identified ‘weak institutional capacities and inefficiencies for implementation of policies and reforms’ as one of the most ‘common root causes’ to the key development challenges that presently confront Ghana.
Although important, these observations raise a critical question regarding the underlying drivers of institutional weaknesses in Ghana. Issues of state capacity in Ghana must be appreciated as the product of the incentives generated by the nature of the political environment. The intense rivalry both between and within political parties for control over state resources has had significant destabilizing effects on bureaucratic capacity in the delivery of public goods in various ways.
First, as a result of the excessive partisanship that characterises the political environment, each ruling party tends to govern mainly based on its election campaign promises, rather than on a broad national development agenda. The result has been ‘a perpetual discontinuity in plans, policy direction and projects, following party turnovers in government’. Second, as a consequence of their high vulnerability in power, there are often ‘strong incentives for ruling elites across both parties to focus on short-term objectives for political survival’?
Third, and more importantly, competitive clientelism means that the administrative capacity and performance of most state institutions have been regularly undermined by the rapid turnover of organisational leaders during political transitions.
Limited exercise of active citizenship
Democratic regimes thrive on active citizenship – the commitment and capacity of ordinary citizens to hold public officials accountable and play active roles in claiming their socio-economic and political rights. Yet, there is overwhelming evidence that the exercise of citizenship among most Ghanaians is yet to progress far beyond the political ritual of voting in presidential and parliamentary elections.
A recent analysis of Afrobarometer survey data shows that despite the constitutional guarantees regarding citizens’ rights to mobilize and demonstrate in the interest of community and national development, most Ghanaians are not ready to exercise the right to embark on demonstration or protest marches. There remains a low level of trust for elected leaders and most state institutions, with the result that most citizens never interfaced with their elected representatives at both the national and local levels.
Limited participation of women in political life
Another persistent governance deficit relates to Ghana’s disappointing progress in promoting gender parity in public and political office. Though no laws limit the participation of women in the political process, and they do participate, but not in the same numbers as men. Women hold fewer leadership positions than men.
Currently, female representation in Ghana’s Parliament is a paltry 14.5%16, compared to 61.3% in Rwanda, 46% in Namibia, 32.9% in Uganda, and 31.9% in Zimbabwe. Cultural and traditional factors also limit women’s participation in political life.
Existing research highlights insults, concerns regarding physical safety, and overall negative societal attitudes toward female politicians continue to hinder women from entering and participating actively in politics at both national and sub-national levels.
Limited youth participation and representation
The youth have long represented an important constituency for political and electoral mobilization in Ghana. More than a third (35.9%) of Ghana’s population falls within the age bracket of 15 and 35 years, according to the 2015 Labour Force Survey. The youth in Ghana continue to have limited participation and representation in leadership and decision-making processes. The exclusion of the youth in governance and decision making is deeply rooted in both the nature of Ghanaian politics and traditional practice.
At the level of parliament, the proportion of members of parliament who could be classified as youth when they entered parliament stands at 4.4% of the total 275 legislature, a slight decline from the 4.75% of 2016.
Conclusions and recommendations
- Building state capacity: A strategy of building specific pockets of effective institutions would be a more realistic way of improving the performance of public sector organisations in the long run. This is because as ruling elites face a credible threat of losing power, both the excluded elite factions and other powerful elites within the ruling coalition, the imperative of short-term political survival will always take precedence over the long-term task of building bureaucratic capability. In such contexts, reformers are likely to make a better impact if attention is focused on building specific pockets of effective state agencies rather than trying to engage in wholesale reforms of the public sector.
- Promoting active citizenship: provide support for civil society in promoting active citizenship and reorienting citizens’ understanding of public goods provisioning from a rights-based perspective. An important factor that underpins the current culture of nonaccountability on the part of local government officials relates to the limited knowledge of ordinary citizens on the services to which they are entitled under their citizenship rights.