The Elite, Elitism, and Ensuing Conversations in Ghana’s Higher Education: Myth or Reality?

Abstract

Contemporary higher education in Ghana and many parts of Africa has European colonial antecedents. In spite of the many goals that it aspired to achieve, a preoccupation was to nurture an elite group. Though widely used, the concept of elite and elitism is vague and hardly conceptualized. It hoovers from status—occupants of the apex or top echelons of an organization/society, to consumption—people with immense wealth. Influence, on the other hand, seems to be a common denominator in both cases. But, does this capture the scope of the phenomenon? This article engages people who have worked in different capacities in Ghana’s higher education space to examine the deeper meanings that could be embedded in elitism, elicits conceptualizations of elitism, and further finds out how elitist higher education is in Ghana. Ultimately, the article intends to initiate a conversation on whether indeed there are elites being produced from the university system. This study was done with reference to an empirical study on decolonizing higher education in Ghana