The Impact of Resettlement on Quality of Life in Ghana: The Mediating Role of Residential Satisfaction

Abstract

The effects of large-scale land acquisitions for development projects such as mining, urbanization and dams are widely contested in the literature. Prior research has focused on the difficulties that resettlement poses for the affected families in terms of their capacity to meet the demands of the new community. This study suggests that resettlement (built environment) quality may act as a predictor and influence the residential satisfaction and quality of life of project-affected families. This study investigates how residential satisfaction influences the relationship between the quality of the dwelling, the context of resettlement homes, and the quality of life of mining-affected families in Ghana. A sample of 256 household heads displaced by a large-scale mining project in Ellembelle was used to evaluate the suggested model. The findings indicate that resettlement quality greatly enhances the quality of life of the mining-affected families. The findings also revealed that residential satisfaction was a significant mediator of the quality of dwellings and the context of the resettlement, in addition to being a strong predictor of quality of life. Indirectly, resident characteristics, such as socioeconomic and demographic conditions, influenced how people felt about their homes and quality of life. These results indicate that residential satisfaction and resettlement quality are accurate indicators of the mining-affected families’ quality of life. Integrating these features make it possible to quantify the mining-affected families’ quality of life for future research and public policy.

Keywords

• resettlement
• housing quality
• residential satisfaction
• quality of life
• mining-affected families
• Ghana