The Role of Pentecostal Churches as an Influential Arm of Civil Society in Ghana
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Date
2014-12
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Publisher
Ghana Social Science Journal
Abstract
This paper argues that in its bid to mediate between the State and the social
world by promoting discourse, Pentecostalism in Ghana has become a strong
arm of civil society. The general distrust in the weak state in Africa projects
church organizations in the limelight, thereby making Pentecostal churches,
for example, wield power by exercising their authority in the public sphere by
means of public discourse on individual success and wealth creation (business
entrepreneurship), good governance, and national development.
Pentecostalism achieves this by cultivating civil society strategies such as
media presence, organizational and leadership skills. By these means it exerts
social, economic and political influence over the Ghanaian polity. At the same
time, however, the weaknesses of Pentecostal-based organizations are akin to
those of the leaders of State institutions and political leaders, as the ills and
sins of the society also apparently affect them
Description
Ghana Social Science Journal, 11 (2), 77-101.
Keywords
Christianity, Churches, Civil Society, Good Governance, National Development, Pentecostalism, Political Economy of Religions