Resistances to the implementation of comprehensive sexuality education curriculum in Ghana’s educational institutions

Abstract

Comprehensive sexuality education (CSE) has significant potential to contribute to the health and well-being of adolescents and young people. While some aspects of CSE are taught through in-school and out-of-school programmes in Ghana and other African countries, national scale-up efforts often need support. The proposal of a curriculum guideline to support the incorporation of CSE in the pre-tertiary school system was met with significant opposition from some education stakeholders. This paper examines the opposing viewpoints and their arguments against the curriculum guideline. The analysis reveals that the opponents successfully hindered implementation by advancing three significant arguments: that CSE promotes a transnational LGBTQ agenda, is age-inappropriate, and lacked adequate stakeholder engagement. Polarized partisan political blame-shifting between the opposition National Democratic Congress and the ruling New Patriotic Party intensified these claims. The paper concludes with lessons for promoting CSE scale-up in Ghana and similar contexts.

Keywords

• Comprehensive sexuality education
• curriculum
• guideline
• opponents
• proponents
• contestations