Paper Short Abstract:

This piece explores how the discourses of Ghanaian political elites surrounding LGBT rights and restrictions differ in national and global arenas. I investigate calculations, tacit conventions and mateiral consequences that make some utterances unspeakable in one setting, and obligatory in others.

Paper Abstract:

In 2021, numerous watershed moments amplified a growing sense of anti-LGBT* sentiment in Ghana. The NGO LGBT+ Rights Ghana’s Office was forcibly shut down by police; 21 lesbian bisexual queer and intersex women and trans advocates were arrested during a workshop on human rights; and Parliament introduced a bill that punishes LGBT*-related identities, cultural productions, and solidarities. The bill was written mainly by the opposition party of the present government. Some consequently suggest ulterior motives behind its introduction. In theory, its assent into law would cast the present administration in a negative light in the eyes of wealthy pro-LGBT* governments and institutions that provide significant aid to Ghana. Its rejection, however, would make the government appear compromised in the eyes of Ghanaian voters and weaken the party’s prospects in the upcoming election.

The opposition may therefore be playing on the vulnerabilities of what Kóczé & Rövid would refer to as ‘double discourse’ (2017) where political elites mobilize different ‘faces’ or discourses in different political arenas. As my field research demonstrates, political elites may appear lukewarm or pro-LGBT at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, while propagating anti-LGBT animus at home. I investigate the political economy of decorum in Ghana and ask what rational calculations and tacit conventions render some utterances unspeakable in one setting, and obligatory in others. I further explore the material consequences of this calculus.

Works Cited

Kóczé, A., & Rövid, M. (2017). Roma and the politics of double discourse in contemporary Europe. Identities, 24(6), 684–700. https://doi.org/10.1080/1070289X.2017.1380338