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Accepted Paper:

Politics of Development Expertise: the exclusion of National Development Experts (NDEs) in Ghana's aid sector  
Palash Kamruzzaman (University of South Wales) Emmanuel Kumi (University of Ghana)

Paper short abstract:

This paper focuses on how power dynamics between the International Development Experts (IDEs) and National Development Experts (NDEs), and internal political structure and competition between NDEs and politicians lead to the NDEs' exclusion from national policymaking in Ghana's aid sector.

Paper long abstract:

This paper explores the processes of how the National Development Experts (NDEs) are frequently excluded in Ghana's aid sector including decision making and knowledge production. To understand this, we focus on the narratives of the NDEs in Ghana who are perceived to be well placed in elucidating different mechanics of such exclusionary processes and practice. Insights from twenty-five semi-structured interviews with Ghanian NDEs were conducted in two phases between July and September 2017 and September and December 2018. Two themes seem to explain the processes of NDEs' exclusion in Ghana's development policy practices very closely. First, the power imbalance within the aid architecture between the International Development Experts (IDEs) from the West and the Ghanian NDEs. Second, the internal political structure in Ghana and competition among the NDEs. The existing literature on local aid workers (Sundberg, 2019; Sou, 2021; Roth, 2019) focuses exclusively on their engagements with foreign expatriates. While the main arguments complement the existing literature, empirical evidence presented in this paper also adds new insights about the internal dynamics such as competition and power relations between NDEs and local actors including bureaucrats and politicians that are almost non-existent in current scholarship. At a time when 'decolonising development' is often reverberated either as a slogan or genuine goal it is imperative that the politics of exclusion among/within development experts is critically scrutinised to ensure a just sustainable future of the aid sector through the lived experience and learning of the NDEs.

Panel P31c
Leaving, Living and Learning: Knowledge Production and its Impact on Designing Just Sustainable Futures
  Session 1 Wednesday 6 July, 2022, -