• A History of Indigenous Slavery in Ghana: From the 15th to the 19th Century

    Academic research and publication on indigenous slavery in Ghana and in Africa more widely have not received attention commensurate with the importance of the phenomenon: the history of indigenous slavery, which existed long before the trans-Atlantic slave trade, has been a marginal topic in documented historical studies on Ghana. Yet its weighty historical, and contemporary relevance inside and outside Africa is undisputed.
    This book begins to redress this neglect. Drawing on sources including oral data from so-called slave descendants, cultural sites and trade routes, court records and colonial government reports, it presents historical and cultural analysis which aims to enhance historical knowledge and understanding of indigenous slavery. The author further intends to provide a holistic view of the indigenous institution of slavery as a formative factor in the social, political and economic development of pre- colonial Ghana.
  • Politics in Ghana: From the Earliest Times to the Eve of the Fourth Republic

    Politics in Ghana: From the Earliest Times to the Eve of the Fourth Republic has been introduced to equip political science students and avid readers interested in the subject as well as both budding and seasoned politicians with effective tools that give them a firm understanding of Ghana’s political development.

    The book provides a bird’s eyes view and a penetrating insight into controversial issues that shaped events and developments of the country from the pre-colonial times through the struggle for independence to the post-independence era.

    In an accessible and engaging writing style, the book effectively analyses the nexus between the geographical features of the country, particularly the ethnic and regional distributions of the people and how they impacted on the political development during the period under review. It also traverses the constitutional development and other factors that triggered political action from the late 1800s to the eve of the Fourth Republic. Ghana witnessed three republics each of which was truncated by military juntas that provided interim administration to fill the hiatuses before the eventual transition to democratic rule for the fourth time. Factors that occasioned the interruptions and the subsequent return to constitutional rule together with the performances of the various regimes and their ramifications are incisively analysed.

    Politics in Ghana: From the Earliest Times to the Eve of the Fourth Republic is an authentic reference document for any person who is thirsty for a better understanding of political events that preceded the final return to constitutional rule in 1993.

  • Understanding Political Institutions (AsanteBrako Political Series)

    Understanding Political Institutions comprehensively addresses both the theoretical and practical aspects of institutions in governance and politics. Written in an accessible style, the text is designed to introduce readers to political institutions and how they function to ensure sustainable peace and stability in the state.

    The focus of the text is on meanings, origins, features, structures, principles, theories and functions of both formal and informal political institutions, including the legislature, executive and judiciary, as well as civil society organizations, such as political parties, interest groups and the media. Other institutional processes and principles like separation of powers, checks and balances, rule of law, electoral processes and systems and constitutions are discussed.

    Each chapter features the key issues discussed, a summary of contents and sample examination questions. Understanding Political Institutions is indeed an essential reader and a must-read for anyone who is interested in gaining adequate knowledge about how both formal and informal political institutions function in a state.

  • J. A. Braimah: Biography of a Trailblazer (Hardcover)

    This well researched book is not just a biography of the first-ever Member of Parliament and Cabinet Minister from Northern Ghana, but a packed chronicle of the stormy political period of the pre- and immediate post-independent Ghana, narrated through the lens of a man in whose soul the development of Ghana – and Northern Ghana in particular – burns. It highlights the slow but momentous inclusion of Northern Ghana in the affairs of the Gold Coast.

    The mistrust that characterized the relationship between Dr. Kwame Nkrumah and the leaders of Northern Ghana, which culminated in the formation of the Northern Peoples Party, and Northern Ghana’s struggle for a dignified independence; makes this biography a must have for scholars, students, politicians and all who are interested in the twists and turns of this period.

  • Death of an Empire: Kwame Nkrumah in Ghana and Africa

    A participant-witness in the history of the transition from Gold Coast to Ghana, Jantuah who died in 2011 at the age of 89, reflects and interprets with unique understanding some of the major events of the 1950s and 60s as well as foreign policy formulation including his role as a diplomat during the Algerian struggle for Independence and France’s Charles de Gaulle’s retrogressive policies; his dealings with the African National Congress and it’s president, Oliver Tambo, an Apartheid and Southern Rhodesia; becoming at the end an executor to his friend – Nkrumah’s Will.

    The book also has reflections on Ghana’s Fourth Republic and development on the African Continent since. It is edited with a detailed introduction by Jantuah’s nephew, the development specialist and literacy writer, Ivor Agyeman-Duah, who he worked with over the years on this and is currently a Visiting Associate Professor at the University of Johannesburg in South Africa.

  • Africa in Contemporary Perspective

    An important feature of Ghanaian tertiary education is the foundational African Studies Programme which was initiated in the early 1960s. Unfortunately hardly any readers exist which bring together a body of knowledge on the themes, issues and debates which inform and animate research and teaching in African Studies particularly on the African continent.

    This becomes even more important when we consider the need for knowledge on Africa that is not Eurocentric or sensationalised, but driven from internal understandings of life and prospects in Africa. Dominant representations and perceptions of Africa usually depict a continent in crisis. Rather than buying into external representations of Africa, with its ‘lacks’ and aspirations for Western modernities, we insist that African scholars in particular should be in the forefront of promoting understanding of the pluri-lingual, overlapping, and dense reality of life and developments on the continent, to produce relevant and usable knowledge.

    Continuing and renewed interest in Africa’s resources, including the land mass, economy, minerals, visual arts and performance cultures, as well as bio-medical knowledge and products, by old and new geopolitical players, obliges African scholars to transcend disciplinary boundaries and to work with each other to advance knowledge and uses of those resources in the interests of Africa’s people.

  • 5 Presidents, 8 Elections, 30 Years Later: How Ghanaians See Their Democracy

    Ghana’s Fourth Republic, a multiparty democracy, has seen five presidents, held eight successful elections and, as of this writing, is in its thirtieth year. This makes it unique in several ways, compared to previous attempts at multiparty democracy, in that it is the longest-lasting republic so far in the country’s post-independence history. It has outlived the first, second, and third republics combined by more than eighteen years.
    What explains this unique period and change in the political trajectory of Ghana? Why has the country’s most recent attempt at multiparty democracy lasted this long?
    Drawing on answers to questions in the Afrobarometer survey, administered nine times at periodic intervals between 1999 and 2022, this book describes in twenty themes and fifty-one observations, how Ghanaians see their democracy. The book covers themes such as trust in institutions, partisanship, support for democracy, governments handling of the policy priorities of Ghanaians, among many others. The book points out the key lessons of the last thirty and the challenges ahead in the country’s efforts to deepen democratic governance.

  • Everything That Happened and The People Who Made It

    The book is a concise and comprehensive profile of the Top 10 entertainment brands in Ghana who dominated the 2010-2020 decade. Its simple language vividly describes and provides clarity of behind-the-scene happenings of Showbiz events within the decades.

    The author made a trip down memory lane by actively seeking expert knowledge and witness accounts of crucial events in the Ghanaian entertainment industry, even beyond the decade under review.

  • The Fear of Failure: An Autobiography

    From Agomanya in the Eastern Region of Ghana, a 65 year old J. P. Adjimani narrates his life and how his fear of failure spurred him on instead of derailing him. In his autobiography, the biochemist unravels why he was never promoted to be a professor despite having a 28-year admirable career in Ghana’s premier university, University of Ghana.

  • Kwame Nkrumah and the Dawn of the Cold War: The West African National Secretariat, 1945-48

    The history of a Pan-Africanist movement based in Britain and its role in the Cold War in Africa

    The West African National Secretariat (WANS) has almost been forgotten by history. A pan-Africanist movement founded in 1945 by Kwame Nkrumah and colleagues in London and France, WANS campaigned for independence and unity. Nkrumah returned to the Gold Coast in late 1947. The colonial government accused him of being a communist and fomenting the riots of early 1948. He was jailed. This led to the beginning of the Cold War in West Africa.

    Drawing on archival research including the newly released MI5 files, Marika Sherwood reports on the work of WANS, on the plans for a unity conference in October 1948 in Lagos, and on Nkrumah’s return home. Sherwood demonstrates that colonial powers colluded with each other and the US in order to control the burgeoning struggles for independence. By labelling African nationalists as ‘communists’ in their efforts to contain decolonisation, the Western powers introduced the Cold War to the continent.

    Providing a rich exploration of a neglected history, this book sheds light for the first time on a crucial historical moment in the history of West Africa and the developmental trajectory of West African independence.

  • Fair State Charter For Africa

    In this book, Dr. Nii Amu Darko outlines a new charter for a fair state as the template for good governance in Africa.  In a fair state, opportunities are fairly spread across the nation; political power is proportional to electoral mandates and fairly distributed among the groups that form the nation; and responsibility for service delivery is the duty of every citizen. England gave the world the Magna Carta and Dr. Nii Amu Darko proposes the Fair State Charter as the foundation for good governance and prosperity in Africa. The charter addresses three main areas:  Unity of purpose; unity of governance through a reformed electoral system and national governance; and the 21st Century being Africa’s century of prominence. The unities he prescribes are on a national rather than a continental basis. So that the success of one country based on the ideas in the charter, can be replicated in other nations throughout the continent.

  • Weep Not, Africa

    In this book, Dr. Nii Amu Darko proposes a rare template for political economy suitable for the multi-ethnic African state, both in terms of political organization and sustainable economic development.  Essentially, he combines the constitution and manifesto of the African Reform Movement (ARM) into this book as a roadmap for realizing Africa’s arrested potential.  Dr. Darko proposes the creation of the new African with a new mindset that would go on to create a new society based on love, hope and faith. The ARM manifesto is the refreshing plan of action for the revolution to attain the elusive true independence by ending imperialism in all its forms, gain true independents and foster opportunities and prosperity for all.  To paraphrase Nkrumah, Darko expounds the notion that “the independence of Ghana is meaningless unless it is linked with the total liberation of its economy from Finance Capital.”

  • The 5th Republic: Constitutional Reforms To Rescue, Resuscitate and Restore Ghana

    In this book, Dr. Nii Amu Darko proposes an alternative to Ghana’s 4th Republic and offers prescriptions for thorough constitutional reform. Based on the tenet that the ills of our political excesses and economic stagnation are rooted in the shortcomings of the constitution, he slices Ghana’s 1992 Constitution apart and lays out a systematic blueprint for a new Constitution that would usher in Ghana’s 5th Republic.  With the ideas laid out in this book, Dr. Darko’s objective is to put the country on track for effective political reform and sustainable development. He addresses many issues and sectors of national interest for the “new Ghana”, including the Constitution, territories, citizenship, representation of the people, the Executive, legislature, judiciary, security and defence and chieftaincy.

  • Kwame Nkrumah: Vision and Tragedy

    The yearlong celebration of Ghana’s Golden Jubilee provides a fitting context for the republication of the book Kwame Nkrumah: Vision and Tragedy. In the lead-up to the celebration and over the course of the year, the life and times of Kwame Nkrumah will receive unprecedented public attention, official and unofficial. Kwame Nkrumah’s very wide name-recognition is, paradoxically, accompanied by sketchy, often oversimplified knowledge about the events and processes of his life and times. For most of those born after independence in 1957, such knowledge does not extend much beyond who Kwame Nkrumah was and vague notions about he won us Independence.

    This book presents new material and new analysis, which helps to clarify aspects of the record, while advancing new perspectives. What comes across clearly throughout the book is the significant contribution of Nkrumah’s vision and personality at a critical moment in the history of Africa and the Third World. He, perhaps more than any other, was able to identify, focus and catalyse the major factors and players driving the struggle for political independence in Ghana and liberation in other parts of Africa. In the process, he committed his life and work totally to a wide variety of activities and processes in Ghana, the continent and in the global Non-Aligned Movement.

    “This is an objective study which should be read by all concerned with the history of post-colonial Africa.” – Conor Cruise O’Brien Former Vice Chancellor, University of Ghana, Legon

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