Curbing illicit financial out-flow from Africa: the phenomenology of institutions in Ghana

Abstract

Transactions of illicit financial out flow (IFoF) in Africa and elsewhere are steeped in secrecy and controversy. They are also burdened by normativism in research; consequently, the likely dimensions of their instrumental worth has not received much attention. Using relativism and institutional phenomenology, focusing on Ghana, this paper attempts to tease out the nature of transactions around IFoF regulatory state institutions. Findings from elite elicitation interviews and secondary data show that IFoF in Ghana is high and enabled by a shadowy network of transactions between state agencies and regulated entities with the implication of a blurred and porous boundary between the two sectors. This suggests that the legal system of state regulatory agencies has been short circuited and their mandates tamed as a result. These findings call for further investigation into how, inter alia, the politics of IFoF induced transactions between state agencies and the private sector is maintained.