Conclusion: Ghana in the Next Thirty Years: Public Sector Management, Economic Governance, and International Relations

This chapter summarizes the findings of the 14 chapters, and their implications for the theoretical, comparative, and empirical scholarship. It emphasizes that there is a link between public sector management, economic governance, and international relations and the gains and deficits of the Fourth Republic. It discusses the drivers of transformation that will guide Ghana in the next thirty years. They include learning from Ghana’s history, learning from some of the positive lessons of the developmental states, internalizing performance management; developing public sector resilience to address wicked problems, and transformative leadership. It concludes that transformation in all sectors is what is required if Ghana is to survive and make an impact on the community of nations in the next thirty years. Realistic views, however, harsh that they may seem have been expressed on the progress made in the Fourth Republic. Notwithstanding this, one needs to adopt an optimistic and progressive view and attitude in the country’s dogged march to achieve equitable development and the building of a free and just society, which have been an illusion since independence in 1957.