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| Title: | Mobilizing for Change: A Case Study of Market Trader Activism in Ghana |
| Author: | Awuah, Emmanuel |
| Year: | 1997 |
| Periodical: | Canadian Journal of African Studies |
| Volume: | 31 |
| Issue: | 3 |
| Pages: | 401-423 |
| Language: | English |
| Geographic term: | Ghana |
| Subjects: | political conflicts marketplaces market vendors Economics and Trade Development and Technology Labor and Employment |
| External link: | https://www.jstor.org/stable/486193 |
| Abstract: | This article analyses the mobilization efforts and activism of market traders in the Kumasi Central Market, estimated to be the largest market structure not only in Ghana but in the West African subregion as well, within the context of State restructuring processes from 1983 to 1991. The article argues that State restructuring policies negatively affected market traders' capital accumulation, as well as limited their access to essential urban infrastructural resources. One of the contradictions of the State restructuring process was the redefinition of central and local government relationships. Local governments came to depend solely on taxes from residents of their communities. The Kumasi Metropolitan Authority's (KMA) revenue-generating strategies included higher rents, licensing fees, late payment fees and fees for stall expansion in the Central Market. These fees, however, did not translate into improved services. Traders adopted several strategies of activism vis-à-vis the KMA, including petitions, demonstrations, appeals to influential people, and using the mass media. The article shows that traders did not react directly to IMF-induced adjustment policies, but challenged their indirect effects on their survival in the marketplace. Bibliogr., notes, ref., sum. in French. |
