Emerging Issues in Public Sector Reforms in Africa: An Assessment of Ghana and Nigeria

Abstract

Public sector reform (PSR) has been quite popular in Africa and in recent years, several African countries have implemented far-reaching governance and public service reform measures. The aim of this article is to consider the historical development of Public Sector Reform in Africa and the philosophy behind the ubiquitous wave of reform in the continent. The article discovers that those reform measures have so far gone through three different phases to promote and/or accelerate the revitalization of the public service. It identifies some major challenges that account for the monumental failure of PSR. Finally, the paper offers suggestions on how African countries can free themselves from the doldrums of current PSR. This article will not only broaden the frontier of knowledge in the field of public administration but also address the present and on-going reality of public sector reforms in the West African sub region. This study uses a ‘Literature Survey’ in examining the issue in question.

Keywords

• Public Sector Reform
• Global South
• ‘Statism’
• NPM
• Public Service, Ghana
• Nigeria