Crisis Politics and the 2020 “Imposition of Restrictions Act” in Ghana

Abstract

Around the globe, the Covid-19 pandemic generated uncertainties in relation to the novel virus itself, its treatment and its socio-economic effects on an international scale. In addition, various claims of truth about the pandemic added to the situation’s complexity. In this article, we analyse Ghana’s initial response to Covid-19 to illustrate how complex assemblages of political elites and knowledge production infrastructures intersected in the pursuit of capturing knowledge about an unfolding crisis. With the critical function of knowledge production about the pandemic as a lens, this article narrows in on Ghana’s crisis response and the composition of the contemporary Ghanaian political landscape it revealed, particularly in relation to declining trust in policies and State institutions.