Browsing by Author "Ackah, E.K."

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Accountability in Governance A Comparative Study of Athenian And Ghanaian Institutions of Accountab
(2011-07) Gyamfi, K.; Adenkannbi, G.O.; Ackah, E.K.; University of Ghana, College of Humanities, School of Arts, Department of Philosophy and Classics
The ability of citizens to scrutinise officials is a long-standing power, and central to the strength of democracy. Consequently, it is of critical importance to the well being of any society, and the individuals who are a part of it, that their government, and the people who manage it, are held highly accountable for their actions or, in some cases, their failure to act, since this helps to minimise human deprivation and corruption. For ancient Athenians, making officials accountable through strengthened institutions of public accountability — such as the Heliaia (the populr tribunal or the supreme court of the land), the dokimasia(an investigative body constituted either by the boule or in the heliaia, to test whether a man was formally qualified to hold an office), the euthyna (the body that examined the accounts of every public official),the boule (the popular council or the council of citizens appointed to run daily affairs of the city) and the ecclesia (the principal assembly of the Athenian democracy) — was the key to lent. This thesis concentrates on the systems and procedures two institution^ ^^accountability in the oldest established democratic government in the world (A th en s),% ^d o y flia1a§;and the euthyna, and attempts to establish a correlation between the two institutions of accountability aforementioned with two institutions of accountability for public officials (the appointments committee of parliament and the audit service) in one of the first country to achieve independence in sub-Saharan Africa (Ghana). The euthyna was the companion of the dokimasia. Dokimasia and euthyna were ways of ensuring the proper public behaviour of politicians. The dokimasia was an obligatory procedure by which a jury checked that those voted in or drawn by lot for a particular official position were entitled to hold it. The euthyna occurred at the end of the official s tenure, and was compulsory for all citizens elected or allotted to perform public duties, bar jury members. The procedure of euthyna came in two parts. First, there was a financial audit to ensure that the official had not embezzled money (klope), or accepted bribes (dora). Second, the official faced investigation in the open agora, at which any citizen who wished (ho boulomenos) might bring forward accusations of neglect of duty or improper use of power. An in-depth study of the appointments committee of parliament and the audit service of the present Ghanaian democratic dispensation reveals that these state institutions of accountability share some similarities and dissimilarities lessons can be derived from the Athenian experience for advancing the emerging
Aristotle on God
(Philotheos: International Journal for Philosophy & Theology (10): 91-111, 2010) Ackah, E.K.
Aristotle’s theology as expounded in his Metaphysics is seen as radically distinct from his predecessors’ and farther still from traditional religion. Contributing to this view are three apparently peculiar conceptual features of Aristotle’s God: (i) that God is solely a final cause who moves all other things as being loved or desired; (ii) that God is a self-thinking thinking; (iii) and that God is ontologically separate from the visible cosmos. No pre-Aristotelian philosopher has adduced (i)-(iii) in an argument to the existence and nature of God; and this prompts the question of how Aristotle’s theology stands to preceding thought. This article argues that, despite appearances, the fundamental assumptions and basic elements of Aristotle’s theology and religion are an adaptation of his philosophical predecessors’, and that Aristotle differs from his predecessors only by being closer to and logically more consistent with traditional religion. This conclusion is without prejudice to the acute analytical distinctions and philosophical refinements by which Aristotle transposed preceding thought into his own.
Civilisations of Antiquity
(Accra : Dwumfour Publications, 162pp, 2010) Ackah, E.K.
This book draws attention to two important but often ignored facts about pre-industrial antiquity. The first is that certain lifestyles and life-conditions in antiquity, along with their corresponding attitudes, motivations, dispositions, and practices do promote our physical and social-psychological well-being much more efficiently than certain modern lifestyles and life-conditions. The second is that the increasingly globalised standards of excellence in the artistic, scientific and technological enterprise have had a long gestation and are the common heritage of mankind: they date back several thousand years and are the culmination of various creative and imaginative efforts by innumerable, often anonymous, individuals from several cultures of antiquity, including African, Arabic, Chinese, Graeco-Roman, Indian, Mesoamerican, and Mesopotamian cultures. These two facts must interest all those who seek to understand how the past has shaped the present and can guide us towards the future.
An Introduction to Ancient Rome
(Adwinsa Publications Ghana Ltd., 354pp, 2010) Ackah, E.K.
The nearly 2000 years of the history of the Roman Empire is, without argument, one of the richest sources of information about human nature. This highly abridged version of the Roman experience, which concentrates only on the western part of the Empire, highlights aspects of the Roman experience—governance, politics, Rome’s imperialist motives, Romanisation, slavery, art and architecture, political economy, entertainment, education, philosophy, law, and religion—in order to (1) reveal creative responses to challenges of existence, and varieties of personality, disposition, and motivation that could define humanity; (2) illuminate the imperial dynamics that would implicitly account for the cultural and institutional changes in Africa as a consequence of Western imperial interventions.
The Socio-Political Implications of the Portrayal of Women in Aristophanes' 'Women Plays'
(University of Ghana, 2012-06) Owusu-Asiamah, M.; Onayemi, F.; Ackah, E.K.; University of Ghana, College of Humanities, School of Arts, Department of Philosophy and Classics
Literary records representing women in the ancient Athenian society are heavily dependant on the writings of men and that has influenced the portrayal of women. However, the ancient Athenian society has some outstanding similarities and differences in areas such as: the performance of rituals, family life and shared values in the society. The positions of women in the Athenian society are characterized by male domination. From childhood the girl comes under the authority of her father and upon marriage that of her husband. Throughout a woman’s life she remains under the subordination of a man and she is expected to work without complaint. The objective of this work is: to collect passages from Aristophanes’ three ‘women plays’ namely Lysistrata, Thesmophoriazusae and Ecclesiazusae because these plays are deemed to represent Aristophanes’ detailed portrayal of Athenian women. The depiction of women in the plays reflects the general view of women during the fourth and fifth centuries BC. Then there would be analyses of the implications that arose from their portrayal such as their roles as wives, mothers and intruding into the public sphere of men (assembly) that comes to the fore in the plays. It is pertinent to remember that the representation of women on stage is the representation of a male’s interpretation of women, since men played all parts in the play. I conclude that Aristophanes’ portrayal of Athenian women should be accepted with some caution since not all of his portrayal can be said to have truly represented women.
Socrates, the Moral Expert in the Crito Philotheos
(International Journal for Philosophy & Theology (8): 75-88, 2008) Ackah, E.K.
This article argues against the common interpretation according to which Plato’s dialogue Crito affirms the philosophic belief that there are no moral experts. It shows that Socrates’ response to the character Crito’s moral argument to escape from lawful prison on grounds of an unjust conviction articulates the structure of a moral decision far superior in rationality to Crito’s, which exemplifies the anatomy of conventional moral decision-making.
The Trial of Socrates: A Study in Legal Moralism
(‘Nigeria and the Classics’. Journal of University of Ibadan (23): 83-91., 2007) Ackah, E.K.
of the law. The paper concludes that in the nature of some public morality crimes, it is desirable to leave the scope of the law empirically underdetermined, so that the Athenian criminal law in question does not fail in legality; that it was appropriate for Socrates to plead his character and to use persuasion as proof; and that it was legitimate to engage public opinion, represented by the jury, in the determination of the empirical content of the law. Based on the trial of Socrates, this is a study in legal moralism, which concerns whether the law does in fact or ought to enforce moral standards. Given that the law is sometimes used to enforce standards of public morality, as is the law against obscenity, bigamy, pornography, and so on, this paper is concerned with certain juridical problems associated with public morality law—problems about legality, and about whether in some public morality crimes the character of the accused is legitimate evidence, persuasion can constitute proof, and the jury can play a determining role in interpreting the empirical content