RECONSTRUCTING CIVIL-MILITARY RELATIONS AND THE COLLAPSE OF DEMOCRACY IN GHANA, 1979-81

Abstract

This article attempts to contribute to an understanding of the challenges involved in trying to bring military and security agencies under constitutional rule in new democracies by analysing the case of the Limann regime and the failed democratic transition in Ghana in 1979-81. In the aftermath of democratization in 1979 the civilian government made aggressive (and not always diplomatic) efforts to bring the armed forces under its control. In this instance both the civil government and the military command were threatened by the possibility of a coup from below and were anxious to prevent it. The analysis tries to answer the question of why the government and the military command failed to make common cause, examining first the conflict between civilian officials and the military high command over jurisdictional and other issues, and then between the security agencies themselves that provided the opening for the overthrow once again of democracy. The coup itself was the result of the double crisis of civil and military authority. The institutional arrangements through which civil command has been exercised are examined; it is argued that civil control of the military in independent Ghana has historically been a myth, and that the existence of a civilian regime does not necessarily suggest civil control of the military.