Paper short abstract:

With a focus on the temporalities of policy making, the paper examines Ghana's new biometric civic registration project, paying close attention to its fundamental future orientation and the rhythms and schedules of project implementation and financialization.

Paper long abstract:

Biometric identity registration technologies are perpetuating throughout the world. Developing countries in particular have recently been seen to construct biometric population registers in partnership with international donor organizations. This paper traces the temporal entanglements produced by transnational policy mobilities in the inception and implementation of Ghana's national biometric identity registration project. In 2008, Ghana famously introduced the first biometric banking system in Africa (Breckenridge 2014). Yet, the e-zwich payment system marked only the first step towards the current 'craze' for biometric identity registration in the West African country. Among the numerous biometric identity documents circulating in Ghana's national and sub-national institutions, the national Ghanacard is the most interesting identity registration project in the country, both in terms of its population-wide reach and the complex constellation of institutions, actors and ideas competing within the project. With a focus on the temporalities of policy making (Bear 2015, Clarke et al. 2015), the article examines the project's fundamental future orientation, the temporal context of its production with its specific possibilities of imagining and acting upon certain matters, and the rhythms and schedules of project implementation and financialization.