Since the early 1990s, pressure for democratization in Ghana resulted in the return of a multiparty political system. The victories of the ruling party in the 1992 and 1996 national elections legitimized the liberal economic reform sponsored by international donors; democratization in Ghana may suggest a model of political economy replicable to other African countries.¹⁹ The country is developing a pro-democracy political culture, and although Ghana’s political legacy was not seen as particularly conducive to democratisation, the country’s chances were buoyed not only by encouragement from external aid donors, but also by domestic demands for the end of authoritarian rule. Several developments suggest that there is progress towards democratic consolidation in Ghana, and many procedural criteria for democracy are respected, including multiple political parties and independent interest associations. All of Ghana’s competing parties have stressed a common nationality rather than a divisive ethnic orientation, whilst the judiciary, civil society and independent media – institutions crucial to the success of democracy – have all grown in strength and autonomy.²⁰

Compared with other countries in Africa, Ghana has been highly praised as the most successful example of Word Bank/International Monetary Fund (IMF) sponsored structural adjustment programs by Western donors, and there has been discussion about how Ghana's economic development model could be applied to other countries that face economic declines - Ghana has become one of the pioneering countries that have implemented adjustment programmes.²¹ Well endowed with natural resources, Ghana has roughly twice the per capita output of poorer countries in Western Africa. Gold, timber and cocoa production are major sources of foreign exchange. Receipts from the gold sector should help sustain GDP growth in the future.²² Subsistence agriculture carried out via kin-based production regimes is the primary mode of livelihood. Small-scale trade is equally an imperative of rural economic life. For example, one commodity — an oilseed known as shea (butyrospermun parkii) — is at the centre of these efforts. Procured, processed and traded predominantly by women, this wild tree crop is a staple of the West African economy. The primary source of edible oil in Ghana, as elsewhere in the sub-African Sahara region, shea serves as an important source of food for all and a crucial source of revenue for rural women in particular.²³

GDP per capita is Intl $1272. This falls within the range of $8,272 ( Libya) and $346 ( Democratic Republic of the Congo) in the countries of Africa (Table 5).

Table 5 GDP per capita (Intl $): countries of Africa, 2001

Source: WHO