Institute of African Studies
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Item Parallel Or Dependent? The State, Chieftaincy And Institutions Of Governance In Ghana(African Affairs, 2019) Adotey, E.In recent policy frameworks, traditional authorities have been (re) assigned roles of directly representing civil society and local communities as key actors in development, leading to questions about the relationship between the chieftaincy institution and the state in governance. Using the example of a chieftaincy dispute between the Sokpoe and Tefle, a Tongu-Ewe people of Ghana, at the heart of which are claims to para mount status, this article argues that chieftaincy and the state are not always parallel institutions of governance that derive their legitimacy from different sources. Struggles over chieftaincy hierarchies have become struggles for preferential recognition and access to the state conveyed by membership in the Houses of Chiefs. In effect, the chieftaincy institution may be both parallel to and dependent on the state. The article draws attention to the importance of hierarchy in explaining state-chieftaincy relationships because an understanding of the nuances of legitimacy in chieftaincy will enrich how chiefs are engaged as key actors in development.Item “That Is Still our Tradition but in a Modern Form, but it Still Tells our Story”: Transitions in Buildings in Northern Ghana(Journal of African Cultural Studies, 2023) Addo, I.A.Traditional building practices, which are typically regarded as repositories of heritage and material culture, are undergoing significant transitions in northern Ghana. This transition is evident in the use of building materials other than locally accessible traditional materials. These transitions are driving creativity and innovation as households strive for continuity of tradition, while at the same time, ensuring the sustainability of their buildings. This article analyses the architectural traditions and building practices in northern Ghana using the building work and commentaries of the people of Gbabshe in peri-urban Tamale as a case study. The results show that building practices are transitioning because of environmental changes, migration, wealth accumulation and access to modern building materials and technology. As the peri-urban community becomes urbanised, the people encounter “modern” building styles, which are appropriated into their traditional architecture, resulting in a hybridization of architecture. The innovative tendencies and philosophical continuities of these builders, and the desire to achieve sustainable buildings and the hybridization of Architecture has implications for the future of earth buildings’ relevance, resilience, sustainability, and sociocultural significance in people’s everyday lives.Item A critical examination of factors influencing international students’ choice to study in Ghanaian higher educational institutions(Cogent Education, 2023) Gyamera, G.O.; Asare, W.Recently, many Ghanaian universities have made considerable efforts to reposition themselves in the global space to attract international students. Although there have been some gains, the universities continue to attract a relatively lower number of students. We argue the need to critically examine the factors which influence international students’ choice of study destinations to enhance the relevant approach and experience for them. Utilizing a postcolonial approach and drawing on Using data from two Ghanaian institutions, this paper critically examines international students’ motivation to study in Ghana. The findings indicate that colonial legacies continue to characterise international students’ motivations. There is a need for institutions to create their niche and also provide relevant socio-cultural space to enhance students’ experiences. Global universities should cast off their negative perceptions of African universities and should provide greater and broader opportunities for their students to engage with these universities in their study-abroad programmes.Item “Operation Eagle Eye”: Border Citizenship and Cross-border Voting in Ghana’s Fourth Republic(Journal of Borderlands Studies, 2020) Adotey, E.This article examines the role of elections in bordering through disputes over cross-border voting since Ghana returned to a multi-party democracy in 1992. It uses case studies from some communities that border Togo in the Volta Region of Ghana which is the epicenter of alleged cross-border voting. In these communities, “border citizenship” is expressed through the deployment of ritual space, social and political relations which is across national borders. But this begs the question of whether border citizens view voting as a right or not, or more specifically, contest the border by participating in elections on either side of the border. This article argues that border citizens are not only involved in contesting the border; one can assume to have a border citizenship and still respect the border in elections by refusing the act of cross-border voting. This study not only contributes to border studies by highlighting the importance of electoral politics in the bordering process but it also brings to light the complexities of cross-border voting, since it shows that border residents in the Ghana-Togo borderland communities do not all perceive cross-border voting positivelyItem Sustainable Energy Transition in Russia and Ghana Within a Multi-Level Perspective(Changing Societies & Personalities, 2023) Siakwah, P.; Agyekum, B.; Ermolaeva, Y.V.; Ermolaeva, P.O.This paper is a case study based on a critical review of existing literature and primary data through interviews to investigate energy transition framing and manifestation in the Global South. It provides critical insights into sustainable energy transition in Ghana and Russia within a multi-level perspective (MLP). We argue that whereas Ghana’s energy transition concepts and policies are mirrored by landscape, regime, and niche; practical transitioning has been slow due to inadequate resources and incentives, limited historical culpability in global greenhouse gas, and the country being locked-in to existing hydrocarbon socio-technical systems. The MLP approach is useful in describing energy technologies, markets, and consumption practices. But in Russia, social policy at distinct levels is united by centralised energy, law and technical systems, as well as institutional rules and differences based on costs in economic regions. This paper contributes to the energy transition discourse within the Global South, using Russia and Ghana as cases to highlight how transition policies and practices differ from country to country, driven by economic, political, social, cultural, and historical elements with global frameworks serving as guides. Rigid application of landscape, regime, and niche concepts is challenged in describing and analysing the context-specific nuances in sustainable energy transition policy across spaces. There is a fundamental challenge in mechanical fusing a one-fits-all approach to sustainable energy transitioning in developing countries and societies due to differences in historical contributions to climatic issues and inequality of access to resources and technologies. Energy transition processes and practices should be compatible with social justice.Item Exploring the Motivations of Family Caregivers Caring for Older Persons in Urban Poor Accra, Ghana(Journal of Gerontological Social Work, 2022) Kyei-Arthur, F.; Atobrah, D.There is a general paucity of studies on family caregivers’ motivations for providing care to older persons in the urban poor context in Ghana. This study seeks to explore family caregivers’ motivations for providing care to older persons in urban poor Accra, Ghana. A qualitative descriptive design was used and in-depth interviews were conducted with 31 family caregivers. The QSR NVivo 10 software was used to analyze the data thematically. We found that autonomous motivation inspired family caregivers to provide care. Empathy and affection intrinsically motivated some caregivers to provide care to their recipients, while others were extrinsically motivated by filial responsibility, reciprocity, and obligation to provide care. These findings showed that family caregivers were automatically motivated to provide care to older people. We recommend the need for future studies to explore changes in family caregivers’ motivations to provide care over time.Item When agricultural commercialization fails: ‘Re-visiting’ value-chain agriculture and its ruins in northern Ghana(Globalizations, 2022) Iddrisu, A.Y.; Yaro, J.A.; Ouma, S.Commercialization via value-chain agriculture, under which small farmers often Collaborating with big companies has become a prominent development strategy across Africa. Often framed in win-win terms, the dark sides of such projects (e.g. project failures and related losses are often sidelined in both academic and practitioner discourses on agricultural commercialization. Informed by a collaborative ethnography of a failed value-chain agriculture project in Ghana, this paper seeks to contribute to a better understanding of how farmers, agribusiness companies and development organizations engage with and shape commercialization processes, and how those most affected—farmers and their communities—experience often risky and conflict-prone ventures. In contrast to the win-win-rhetoric adopted by funders and corporations partners in such projects, we foreground the uneven distribution of risk and sacrifices and losses between farmers, communities, and corporate partners; the socially and materially disruptive nature of commercialization projects for host communities; and the clashes between a planner’s view of the world and the environmental realities of commercialization.Item Genealogies of Ghana’s housing crisis: the role of colonial interventions and neoliberal reforms(International Journal of Housing Policy, 2021) Addo, I.A.; Mba, C.C.The urgent need to develop and increase housing units has always featured prominently in electioneering campaigns in Ghana. Successive governments have developed countless programmes to deal with the housing deficit, but there has not been a significant improvement. As we write, the government Ghana is grappling with a housing deficit of over two million units. But why has this problem remained intractable despite what seems like concerted efforts by various administrations to provide affordable housing for Ghana’s more vulnerable populations? Focusing on the 2015 National Housing Policy, this article critically reviews Ghana’s various housing policies and reforms. exploring how colonial policies and neoliberal reforms are separately and jointly implicated, in fundamental ways, in Ghana’s currently engulfing housing crisis. Our findings reveal that the yawning gap is noticeable in Ghana’s overall effort at housing provision for the populace is rooted in the colonial logic of piecemeal intervention. This same logic has continued to traverse successive Ghanaian housing policies through the immediate postcolonial era, the adjustment years, and the current periodItem ‘9th May 2017 is OUR DAY’: The Homeland Study Group Foundation and contested national imaginaries in postindependence Ghana(Nations and Nationalism, 2022) Adotey, E.Ghana has been held up as an oasis of stability in a highly volatile region of Africa due to its peaceful decolonization process, absence of serious civil conflict and successful change of governments. However, in Ghana, as in parts of post-independence Africa, there are lingering secessionist movements that are a legacy of colonialism. The latest comes from the Homeland Study Group Foundation (HSGF) which declared the former British Togoland, a former United Nations trust territory administered by the United Kingdom, as an independent state called Western Togoland. Through the prism of competing or alternative national imaginaries rather than the weak and dysfunctional state paradigm, this article seeks to explain the roots of a form of Togoland nationalism in Ghana in 1956 that remains relevant today. The paper argues that an Apparently, successful integration can stimulate/give support to alternative nationalist imaginaries.Item Revitalizing minority languages using music: Three South-Guan languages of Ghana in focus(Research Journal in Advanced Humanities, 2022) Ansah, M.A.; Agyeman, N.A.; Adjei, G.Several interdisciplinary researchers have been interested in the relationship between language and music, thus producing several works in quest of this interdisciplinary connection. This study, on the other hand, attempted to examine how music may be utilized to reinvigorate the understudied minority languages. It focuses on three South Guan languages: Leteh, Kyerepong and Efutu. Studies done in this area have observed that, in notable respects, language and music are systematically comparable. For instance, the two are similarly constructed of functional and meaningful units; both possess phonemic and morphemic properties. Furthermore, the phonemic and Morphological units/properties are used to produce utterances by rules of sequencing and re-combination. This study draws on on the Affective Filter Hypothesis (Krashen, 1982), which emphasizes the importance of positive emotions in language acquisition. Language surveys were conducted in Winneba, Larteh and Adukrom are where the three languages are spoken. The study concludes that the principle behind the use of songs in teaching a second language, it can be extended to the teaching of learning of less-studied languages/minority languages and ultimately, their revitalization.