The “Numbers Game”: Strategic Reactions to Results-Based Development Assistance in Ghana

Abstract

Current development assistance prioritizes results and evaluative schemes used to generate them as the most effective way of delivering aid by presenting these results as evidence of accomplishment. Aid recipients and donors respond with a crafty tactic, which we term the “numbers game.” They generate results to satisfy assessment expectations irrespective of actual service delivery or satisfaction of the local population. This tactic yields both external and internal legitimacy: recipient countries legitimize their access to external funds while external actors sustain the aid enterprise that is under persistent scrutiny. In-depth interviews, observation, and existing data on everyday life of municipal councils in Ghana lend support to the preeminence given to results-based aid (RBA) in the numbers game. Startlingly, the expected impact targeted by the scheme is strategically set aside so that more capacity gaps are created and hence the need for more RBA resources to address. A delicate balance between results and on-the-ground impact is required for such intervention to have effect.