Mapping the lived experiences of the effects of land guard operations on micro-economic activities and human security in neoliberal Ghana

Abstract

This study adopts a qualitative framework and in-depth interviews to uncover the lived experiences of how land guard operations affect microeconomic activities and human security in the Awutu Senya East Municipality of neoliberal Ghana. The findings highlighted that land guards, which operate within intricate informal systems involving local power brokers, recurrently cause income losses by interfering with construction projects, forcing evictions, destroying or confiscating goods, and uprooting petty traders from their properties. In addition, land guards often employ physical violence, threats, and intimidation to enforce conflicting land claims. These practices generally constitute a major threat to both economic activities and human security because they put locals, landowners, and employees at risk for assaults, injuries, and occasionally fatalities in the municipality. Following the findings, the study argues for comprehensive policy measures including the creation of police-specific anti-land guard task forces to deal brutally with these landguards, expediting the prosecution of land cases through special courts or dockets, expediting the registration and digitization of land titles to reduce land litigation, penalizing traditional authorities who engage in multiple sales or use of land guards, and encouraging community-based mediation panels for land disputes which are targeted at bolstering law enforcement, enhancing land administration, and safeguarding vulnerable populations in fast urbanizing municipalities such as the Awutu Senya East municipality of neoliberal Ghana.