From Community‐Based to State Management: Evaluating Ghana's Small‐Town and Rural Water Governance Reform

Abstract

In Ghana, the government has initiated a reform in rural water management to shift away from community‐based management (CBM) to state management, but research assessing the reform is still insufficient. This study aims to critically evaluate the impact of the reform in addressing rural water challenges. A two‐tier evaluative framework was developed to link capacities to outcomes and incorporates six major criteria. The first three criteria (human resource and organizational capacity, technical capacity, and financial capacity) represent foundational management capacities, whereas the remaining three (water availability, affordability, and quality) capture the performance outcomes that depend on those capacities. The framework was mobilized to empirically examine the water systems in the Central Region. Data were collected through a mixed‐methods approach that included participant observation, semistructured questionnaires, and interviews. The investigation yielded mixed evidence about whether state management made improvements over CBM, highlighting the complexity of rural water governance in Ghana. Although the reform made limited progress in administrative structure, human resource capacity, and technical capacity, it created new problems in bureaucracy, water availability, and water affordability. The findings suggest that the model of water governance—whether CBM or state/corporatized management—is not, in itself, determinative of sustainable service delivery. Rather, sustainability depends on context‐sensitive capacity investments, social protection for the poor, and mechanisms for citizen participation.