Political Parties and Democratic Consolidation in Ghana: The Struggles of Smaller Parties in an Institutionalised Two-Party System

This chapter examines why the smaller parties continuously record dismal outcomes in elections and why they are unable to survive in the political duopoly in Ghana’s Fourth Republic. Many of the smaller parties emerged in elections and they surreptitiously disappear after them. Ghana is a multi-party state, but the abysmal performance of the smaller parties in national elections since 1992 has virtually in practice established Ghana as a political duopolistic state. The chapter assesses smaller parties’ accountability systems, financial and other resources, mobilisation strategies as well as the regulatory framework, and the political environment within which the smaller parties operate to establish why they perform abysmally in elections and why they struggle to survive. Weaknesses, both internal and external factors, have been identified in this study as being responsible for smaller parties’ dismal performance in elections and their inability to survive in Ghana’s institutionalised two-party system.