Neoliberal democratisation, colonial legacies and the rise of the non-state provision of social welfare in West Africa

ABSTRACT

This article explores the rise of the non-state provision of social welfare in West Africa. Over the past three decades, a range of non-state actors, including secular non-governmental organisations, faith-based organisations, for-profit businesses and informal networks have provided access to basic social services such as education and health care even more extensively than states. The article asks: why has the number of non-state providers increased so markedly across Africa, and why do the predominant types of non-state providers vary in different countries? The author argues that neoliberal democratisation during the 1980s and 1990s created new opportunities and spaces for non-state providers. Yet, an analysis of Ghana, Côte d’Ivoire and Liberia shows that colonial legacies have mediated the numbers and types of non-state actors on the ground. The conclusion highlights how this growth in non-state provision has significant negative consequences for citizens’ ability to obtain equitable access to and accountability for social welfare services.

RÉSUMÉ

Cet article examine la progression de la fourniture des prestations et services d’aide sociale non-étatique en Afrique de l’Ouest. Sur les trois dernières décennies, une série d’acteurs non-étatiques, notamment les organisations non gouvernementales laïques, les organisations confessionnelles, les sociétés à but lucratif et les réseaux informels fournissent un accès aux services sociaux de base tels que l’éducation, les soins de santé, davantage encore que les États. L’article pose les questions suivantes : pourquoi est-ce que le nombre de fournisseurs de services sociaux non-étatiques a tellement augmenté en Afrique, et pourquoi est-ce que la nature de ces services varie selon les pays ? Je soutiens que la démocratisation néolibérale des années 80 et 90 a créé de nouvelles opportunités et de l’espace pour les fournisseurs de services non-étatiques. Pourtant, une analyse du Ghana, de la Côte d’Ivoire et du Libéria montre que l’héritage colonial a influencé le nombre et le type d’acteurs non-étatiques sur le terrain. La conclusion met en lumière comment cette croissance des services non-étatiques a des conséquences négatives importantes sur la capacité des citoyens à obtenir un accès équitable à des services sociaux et une responsabilité vis-à-vis de ces derniers.

KEYWORDS:

• Non-state provision
• social policy
• neoliberal
• democratisation
• colonialism

MOTS-CLÉS:

• Services d’aide sociale non-étatiques
• politique sociale
• néolibéral
• démocratisation
• colonialisme

Acknowledgements

This article was partly inspired by a workshop organised by Carina Schmidt, Laura Seelkopf and Hanna Lierse at the University of Bremen on welfare state diffusion around the world. I would like to thank the organisers and participants as well as the ROAPE reviewers for their comments.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Note on contributor

Lauren M. MacLean (PhD, University of California at Berkeley) is an associate professor in the Department of Political Science at Indiana University Bloomington, USA. Her research focuses on the political economy of state-building, non-state service provision and citizenship in Africa. She has numerous books and articles including Informal institutions and citizenship in rural Africa (2010) and The politics of non-state social welfare provision in the Global South (2014, co-edited with Melani Cammett).

Notes

1 Admittedly, the boundaries between state and non-state providers are frequently blurred. Non-state providers may receive significant levels of state financing (Salamon and Sokolowski 1999) or even deliver services from state-owned offices and buildings. Sometimes state civil servants are officially seconded to work for NSPs, or, at other times, civil servants wear two hats, and have founded or work as active employees of NSPs (Tripp 2001).

2 Portuguese colonies were perhaps even more highly centralised (Birmingham 2004), and thus the patterns resemble the trajectory of Côte d’Ivoire before and after conflict. See Table 1.

3 See the resolution and appeal by NGOs at the International Federation for Human Rights (2010).

4 Interviews by author, Department of Social Welfare, Accra, and Bechem, October 1998 and 16 February 1999.

5 In French, encadrer is to frame, to surround or flank, to train and supervise, or to officer (in the military sense).

6 While private facilities constituted nearly one-third of the total number of health care centres, only 31% of these centres met minimal accreditation criteria compared with over 80% of government health care centres (GOL 2011).