Civil society organisations, conflict prevention and peacebuilding in Northern Ghana

Patrick Osei-Kufour, Kaderi Noagah Bukari — Wed, 01 Jun 2022 00:00:00 +0000

The complexity of contemporary violent conflicts requires a shift from the traditional notion that preventing conflicts and building peace reside within governments to include the role of Civil Society Organisations (CSOs). Using a qualitative research design with 20 in-depth interviews conducted with representatives of CSOs in northern Ghana, the study reveals three broad categories of CSOs namely Faith-Based Organisations (FBOs), Community-Based Organisations (CBOs) and Non-Governmental Organisations
(NGOs) performing conflict prevention and peacebuilding roles. These CSOs respond constructively to conflict using dialogue and mediation in different ways by using multiple instruments such as early warning systems and peace education for conflict prevention and peacebuilding. The study shows that, unlike the state, CSOs worked towards conflict prevention and peacebuilding through local initiatives and partnership with communities. The dominant philosophy guiding CSOs’ work is the integrationist paradigm. One serious limitation identified in the conflict prevention and peacebuilding work of CSOs in northern Ghana is the lack of a common peacebuilding framework that can guide them to reduce the duplication of functions within the same space. The paper recommends that CSOs should forge a working partnership to roll out a comprehensive conflict prevention and peacebuilding activity to build sustainable peace for the development of the regions of northern Ghana.

The person or the issue? Relational process, person- and idea- targeted questions in UK and Ghanaian parliamentary questions

Kwabena Sarfo Sarfo-Kantankah — Wed, 01 Jun 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Using parliamentary questions as data and a corpus-assisted systemic functional approach through Wordsmith Tools, this paper, with specific reference to relational processes, explores yes/no interrogatives in order to establish how MPs encode in their questions issues of attitudes, commitments, personalities and ideas of (Prime) Ministers during Ghanaian Minister’s and UK Prime Minister’s Questions. The paper finds that MPs use yes/no interrogatives with relational processes to describe (Prime) Ministers as carriers of certain attributes relating to their positions and responsibilities, while some of the questions are issue- focused. To achieve this, MPs employ two main questioning strategies: person-targeted and idea-targeted pragmatic strategies, thereby raising issues of (Prime) Ministers’ credibility and commitment to duty. The paper has implications for parliamentary questions, party politics and MPs’ and (Prime) Ministers’ duties as representatives of their constituents.

Oguaa Journal of Social Sciences

Civil society organisations, conflict prevention and peacebuilding in Northern Ghana

The person or the issue? Relational process, person- and idea- targeted questions in UK and Ghanaian parliamentary questions