This volume assesses the challenges facing Ghana's economy as it enters its seventh decade and the nation heads towards three quarters of a century of independence.

As Ghana approaches its 60th birthday, optimism and worries for the future continue to be present in equal measure. Economic growth in the last decade has been high by historical standards. Indeed, recent rebasing of GDP figures has put Ghana over the per capita income threshold into Middle Income Country status. However, structural transformation has lagged behind. Fiscal discipline has also eroded significantly and there is heavy borrowing, especially on the commercial market, while elements of the natural resource curse from oil have already occurred. The question most observers ask is whether the gains from two decades of reforms are being reversed. Given this background, this volume brings together leading established and young economists, from within and outside Ghana, to analyze and assess the challenges facing Ghana's economy as it enters its seventh decade and the nation heads towards three quarters of a century of independence. The chapters cover the major macroeconomic and sectoral issues, including fiscal and monetary policy, trade and industrialization, agriculture and infrastructure. The volume also covers a full range of social issues including poverty and inequality, education, health, gender, and social protection. The book also examines the implications of the oil boom for Ghanaian development, and the role of institutions.

The book follows a first edition published in 1989, which focused on the severe economic crisis Ghana faced during the late 1970s and the early 1980s. In this second edition, the authors extend the review up to the mid-2010s, covering the entire period since independence, with a special focus on shifts in economic policy, starting with the adoption of the Economic Recovery Programme in 1983. Huq and Tribe provide systematic coverage of Ghanaian economic development since its independence, reviewing the two main modes of development that have been practiced; and offer an updated, rich data bank. By analyzing the wider macroeconomy of Ghana; its individual sectors; money, banking and trade; infrastructure and environmental policies; and Ghana’s poverty, welfare and income distribution, the authors are able to draw vital lessons from the country’s economic development. ​

As Ghana enters its second half-century, there is a perception of the failure of the economic and political system. This book analyses the reasons for this failure and sets out an agenda as the basis of the course that the nations' policy makers have to steer if Ghana is to fulfil the promise of its independence in 1957.

Identity Transformation and Politicization in Africa: Shifting Mobilization, edited by Toyin Falola and Céline A. Jacquemin, questions whether identity is providing and sustaining power for elites, or fueling oppression and conflicts, being mobilized for exclusionary movements versus inclusive societal changes, or educating in ways that foster progress and development. Do aspects of African identities and the challenges they present also hold prospects for more inclusive and peaceful democratic and representative futures? The contributors cover a wide spectrum of expertise on different African countries (Kenya, Nigeria, Ghana, Rwanda, Morocco, and Libya). They come from diverse disciplines (History, Political Science, Public Administration, Philosophy, Economics and Finance, Cultural Studies, Music, and International Relations), and use various methods and approaches in their research. Some contributors belong to the groups whose identity is being scrutinized and are participants in the efforts to politicize and mobilize, while others remain outside observers, who share some traits or interests with the African identities examined and provide different kinds of insights. Several chapters explore how innovative pedagogical projects studying African history and identity—facilitated by the internet and new social media—transform and connect with the African continent. Each author provides important insights on how mobilization around identity issues has been shifting with the internet and social media.

Since it achieved independence in 1957, the West African state of Ghana has become the torchbearer of African liberation, as well as a laboratory for the study of endemic problems facing the African continent. In terms of democratic consolidation, the country holds a unique position on the continent as beacon of stability and democracy. Politics, Governance, and Development in Ghana takes critical stock of the landmark themes that have dominated its history since independence. The contributors address issues such as citizenship, civil society, the military, politicians, chiefs, transnational actors, the public sector and policies, the executive branch, decentralization, the economy, electoral politics, natural resources, and relations with Asia and the diaspora. These themes support “mobilizing for Ghana’s future,” which is the theme for the diamond jubilee celebration of Ghana’s independence. Edited by Joseph R.A. Ayee, this book will deepen the literature on studies on Ghana especially in the areas of politics, governance, economy and development; serve as a resource for academics, students, practitioners; and commemorate the diamond jubilee celebration of Ghana’s independence.

Citing a paucity of empirical evidence on the poverty and distributional impacts of trade policy reform in Ghana as the main motivation for this volume, the editors (both of the Institute of Statistical, Social and Economic Research at the U. of Ghana) present eleven papers that combine theory and econometric analysis in an effort to assess linkages between globalization, trade, and poverty (including gendered aspects). Specific topics examined include manufacturing employment and wage effects of trade liberalization; the influence of education on trade liberalization impacts on household welfare; trade liberalization and manufacturing firm productivity; the impact of elimination of trade taxes on poverty and income distribution; food prices, tax reforms, and consumer welfare under trade liberalization; impacts on tariff revenues; and impacts on cash cropping, gender, and household welfare; Distributed in the US by Stylus. Annotation ©2012 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com).

Ghana’s Foreign Policy: Kwame Nkrumah’s Normative Legacy and Pan-Africanism examines Ghana’s foreign policy in the post-independence era, focusing on the enduring legacy of Kwame Nkrumah. This book also analyzes the complexity of post-independence foreign policy decision making and the influence of the post-colonial narrative during the Cold War. In this study, Charles Asante argues that the significance and continuity of Nkrumah’s legacy is often attributed to his pan-Africanist leadership on the African continent, fervently articulating an independent African foreign policy. Leaders like Nkrumah, considered themselves as the redeemers of Africa’s political and economic vulnerability from its colonial experiences. Asante finds that, in contrast to the positive experience associated with his independence movement for Ghana, Nkrumah could not build the same kind of vision, engagement, and networks among other African nationalist leaders necessary for successful promotion of a Pan-African region. Despite Nkrumah’s own foreign policy failures in the Congo, the United States of Africa project, and his sudden overthrow in 1966, Nkrumah’s Pan-African vision is still promoted as an important foreign policy objective by Ghana’s politicians, public servants, military, and academics.

This book explores Ghana’s newfound oil wealth and how the revenues it generates can be used to produce inclusive economic growth and development. Comparisons are made with neighboring countries, including Nigeria, Angola, and Equatorial Guinea, to highlight how petroleum resources can create jobs, increase research and development skills, and generate government revenue to invest in local services and infrastructure. The impact of global developments, such as the 2014-16 oil slump and innovation within the industry, are also covered. Petroleum Resource Management in Africa to provide policy suggestions and an operational framework for other petroleum producing countries. It will be of interest to academics and policymakers interested in resource and development economics.

Many world economies and cultures are in the throes of mergers into the dreamt global village. Technology with it’s many euphemisms such as: the “information super highway,” a “period of hyper-change,” “cyber universe,” “digital revolution and renaissance,” etc., are changing the lives of many. Africa, as the author of this book – an experienced and prolific development specialist explains, was only two decades ago classified as a backwater with the presumed characteristic failure of: unstable governance systems, antiquarian agricultural infrastructures, commodity virility for lack of value addition, and low export earnings. Now at the forefront with close to a billion mostly youthful labor and skills markets, its telecommunication networks and economies including start-up digital companies have gone global. From South Africa with the pessimism that greeted post-Apartheid period has come the multinational, Mobile Telecommunication Network (MTN) whose impact on all aspects of development in Africa, the Middle East and Asia is phenomenal. By 2018, MTN controlled a substantial share of the three hundred million market subscriptions in Sub Saharan Africa, the highest growth region in the world. In Ghana, which is the focus of this book, is about how the MTN Group at one time under the chairmanship of Cyril Ramaphosa, later President of South Africa, entered West Africa to lead the market in Ghana. With a largely homegrown skills bank, a new generation is using this technology to grow the country’s economic trajectory in the form of rural agriculture and coastal or blue economies. From cottage industries to mobile financial services and capital markets, the provision of African development via technology influenced solutions and apps to demonstrate how corporate philanthropy is built into venture enterprise.