Abstract
The importance of collective action for local revenue mobilization cannot be over-emphasized, yet has received little attention in current literature. Using strategies for co-operation, collaboration and partnership with local stakeholders to maximize revenue collection appears neglected in the revenue mobilization debate in many developing countries. Extant literature suggests that coercion and public service motivation have been relied upon, yet revenue mobilization remains a significant challenge. This paper expands this body of knowledge by examining the role of collective action and how it helps explain revenue outcomes in the Tema and Accra Metropolitan Assemblies on the one hand, and Ga East and Ga West Municipal Assemblies on the other. It is demonstrated in the discussions that while some of these Assemblies are making better efforts at raising more revenue using more effective collective action measures, others are unable to do the same. This was done through key informant interviews and a survey of the opinions of taxpayers in the selected urban Metropolitan and Municipal Assemblies in Ghana. This paper is part of a broader effort to examine the extent to which local revenue mobilization can be scaled-up in the face of several constraints in a developing country context.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
Data availability
The datasets generated during and/or analysed during the current study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.
References
Aboagye PY, Hillbom E (2020) Tax bargaining, fiscal contracts, and fiscal capacity in Ghana: a long-term perspective. Afr Aff. https://doi.org/10.1093/afraf/adaa004
Agyapong A, Sanyare FN, Wedam EA (2022) Domestic revenue mobilization: institutional challenges in Ghana’s decentralization system. Democratic decentralization, local governance and sustainable development. Springer, Cham, pp 155–171
Akoglu H (2018) User’s guide to correlation coefficients. Turk J Emerg Med 18(3):91–93
Akudugu JA, Oppong-Peprah E (2013) Local government revenue mobilisation and management: the case of Asante Akim South District Assembly, Ghana. J Public Adm Gov 3(2):98–120
Ali M, Fjeldstad O-H, Sjursen IH (2014) To pay or not to pay? Citizens’ attitudes toward taxation in Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, and South Africa. World Dev 64:828–842
Alstadsæter A, Johannesen N, Herry SLG, Zucman G (2022) Tax evasion and tax avoidance. J Public Econ 206:104587
Ankamah SS, Yao F (2013) Evaluating the effectiveness of local revenue mobilization in Kumasi, Ghana. Lex Localis 11(3):431
Awortwi N (2010) The past, present, and future of decentralisation in Africa: a comparative case study of local government development trajectories of Ghana and Uganda. Int J Public Adm 33(12–13):620–634
Bakhru P, Gupta N (2012) Navigating permanent establishment in India. Int Tax Rev 23:34
Balliet D (2010) Communication and co-operation in social dilemmas: a meta-analytic review. J Conflict Resolut 54(1):39–57
Boateng K, Bawole JN (2021) Are two heads better than one? Challenges and prospects of chiefs and local government collaborative community development in Ghana. Community Dev 52:1–19
Bodea C, LeBas A (2013) The origins of social contracts: attitudes Toward Taxation in Urban Nigeria. In APSA 2012 annual meeting paper
Booth D (2012) Development as a collective action problem. Africa Power and Politics Programme Policy Brief, London, p 9
Boswell J (2013) Community and the economy: the theory of public co-operation. Routledge, London
Brown M (1999) Reconceptualizing public and private in urban regime theory: governance in aids politics. Int J Urban Reg Res 23(1):45–69
Chatwin M, Arku G (2018) Co-creating an open government action plan: the case of Sekondi-Takoradi Metropolitan Assembly, Ghana. Growth Change 49(2):374–393
Cobham A, Janský P (2017) Global distribution of revenue loss from tax avoidance: Re-estimation and country results (No. 2017/55). WIDER
Connelly S, Richardson T (2004) Exclusion: the necessary difference between ideal and practical consensus. J Environ Plann Manag 47(1):3–17
Creswell JW, Clark VLP (2017) Designing and conducting mixed methods research. Sage Publications, Thousand Oaks
Daurer V, Krever R (2014) Choosing between the UN and OECD tax policy models: an African case study. Afr J Int Comp Law 22(1):1–21
Drummond P, Daal W, Srivastava N, Oliveira L (2012) Mobilizing revenue in Sub-Saharan Africa: empirical norms and key determinants
Dzansi J, Jensen A, Lagakos D, Otoo I, Telli H, Zindam C (2018) Survey of local government revenue mobilization capacity in Ghana, 2017: summary and policy implications. International Growth Centre Project Report S-33417-GHA-2
Elkin SL (1987) City and regime in the American republic. University of Chicago Press, Chicago
Fainstein NI, Fainstein SS (1983) Regime strategies, communal resistance, and economic forces. Longman, London
Fjeldstad O-H (2001) Taxation, coercion and donors: local government tax enforcement in Tanzania. J Mod Afr Stud 39(2):289–306
Fjeldstad O-H, Semboja J (2001) Why people pay taxes: the case of the development levy in Tanzania. World Dev 29(12):2059–2074
Fjeldstad O-H, Geisler G (2005) Local governance, urban poverty and service delivery in Namibia. CMI Report 2005(12)
Fjeldstad OH, Chaligha AE, Braathen E (2008) Local government reform in Tanzania, 2002–2005: summary of research findings on governance, finance and service delivery
Gavrilets S (2015) Collective action problem in heterogeneous groups. Philos Trans R Soc B 370(1683):20150016
Getha-Taylor H (2018) Expanding the employee engagement model for public service: prioritizing relatedness to achieve collaborative outcomes. In: Stazyk EC, Frederickson HG (eds) Handbook of American public administration. Edward Elgar Publishing, Cheltenham, pp 192–204
Hawkins P (2017) Tomorrow’s leadership and the necessary revolution in today’s leadership development. Henley Business School, Henley
Houlihan B (2012) Sport policy convergence: a framework for analysis. Eur Sport Manag Q 12(2):111–135
Ibietan J (2010) The role of local government in rural development issues. Knowl Rev 20(2):30–38
Irvin RA, Stansbury J (2004) Citizen participation in decision making: is it worth the effort? Public Adm Rev 64(1):55–65
Jensen A (2019) Employment structure and the rise of the modern tax system. No. w25502. National Bureau of Economic Research
Khan AQ, Khwaja AI, Olken BA (2016) Tax farming Redux: experimental evidence on performance pay for tax collectors. Q J Econ 131(1):219–271
Krejcie RV, Morgan DW (1970) Determining sample size for research activities. Educ Psychol Meas 30(3):607–610
Kumler T, Verhoogen E, Frías J (2020) Enlisting employees in improving payroll tax compliance: evidence from Mexico. Rev Econ Stat 102(5):881–896
MacKenzie KM, Gharabaghi B, Binns AD, Whiteley HR (2022) Early detection model for the urban stream syndrome using specific stream power and regime theory. J Hydrol 604:127167
Madumo OS (2016) De-politicisation of service delivery in local government: Prospects for development in South Africa
Mansour M, Keen MM (2009) Revenue mobilization in Sub-Saharan Africa: challenges from globalization. SSRN J. https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1442259
Mgonja MG, Poncian J (2019) Managing revenue collection outsourcing in Tanzania’s local government authorities: a case study of Iringa Municipal Council. Local Gov Stud 45(1):101–123
Moore M (2014) Revenue reform and statebuilding in anglophone Africa. World Dev 60:99–112
Morse JM (2016a) Mixed method design: principles and procedures, vol 4. Routledge, London
National Development Planning Commission from 2014–2017. https://ndpc.gov.gh/media/National_Annual_Progress_Report_2016.pdf
Ostrom E (2009) A general framework for analyzing sustainability of social-ecological systems. Science 325(5939):419–422
Pierre J (2014) Can urban regimes travel in time and space? Urban regime theory, urban governance theory, and comparative urban politics. Urban Aff Rev 50(6):864–889
Puopiel F, Chimsi M (2015) Mobilising internally generated funds to finance development projects in Ghana’s Northern Region. Commonw J Local Gov 18:147–160
Rast J (2015) Urban regime theory and the problem of change. Urban Aff Rev 51(1):138–149
Scott J, Marshall G (eds) (2009) A dictionary of sociology. Oxford University Press, Oxford
Singleton S (2000) Co-operation or capture? The paradox of co-management and community participation in natural resource management and environmental policy-making. Environ Polit 9(2):1–21
Smit W (2018) Urban governance in Africa: an overview. Revue Internationale De Politique De Développement 10:55–77
Steenkamp L-A (2013) Beneficial ownership provisions in tax treaties between developed and developing countries: the Canada/South Africa Example. Int Bus Econ Res J 12:1107
Stone CN (1993) Urban regimes and the capacity to govern: a political economy approach. J Urban Aff 15(1):1–28
Tan SY, Taeihagh A (2020) Smart city governance in developing countries: a systematic literature review. Sustainability 12(3):899
Therkildsen O (2001) Understanding taxation in poor African countries: a critical review of selected perspectives. Forum Dev STud 28(1):99–123
United N (2015) Transforming our world: the 2030 agenda for sustainable development
van den Boogaard V, Prichard W, Beach R, Mohiuddin F (2022) Enabling tax bargaining: supporting more meaningful tax transparency and taxpayer engagement in Ghana and Sierra Leone. Dev Policy Rev 40(1):e12543
Venkatesh V, Brown SA, Bala H (2013) Bridging the qualitative-quantitative divide: guidelines for conducting mixed methods research in information systems. MIS Q 37:21–54
Walker K, Ni N, Dyck B (2015) Recipes for successful sustainability: empirical organizational configurations for strong corporate environmental performance. Bus Strategy Environ 24(1):40–57
Wantchekon L (2017) Policy deliberation and voter persuasion: estimating intrinsic causal effects of town hall meetings. J Dev Eff 9(3):295–304
Wijen F, Ansari S (2007) Overcoming inaction through collective institutional entrepreneurship: insights from regime theory. Organ Stud 28(7):1079–1100
Yeboah EN, Andrew M (2020) Challenges faced by Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assembles (MMDA’S) in internal revenue mobilization in Ghana. Int J Asian Soc Sci 10(1):68–80
Funding
No funding was received to assist with the preparation of this manuscript.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Conflict of interest
The authors have no competing interests to declare that are relevant to the content of this article.
Ethical approval
The study obtained approval from the University of Ghana’s Ethical Committee for the Humanities (ECH). The research complied with the ethical requirements as approved by the ECH.
Informed consent
Permission was obtained from all four Metropolitan and Municipal Assemblies before the data were collected. Additionally, individual participants’ consent was verbally solicited before their participation. Participants were also assured that they could truncate the process at any point where they felt uncomfortable with the information they provided.
Rights and permissions
Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.
About this article
Cite this article
Mahama, P.Y., Abdulai, AG. & Asamoah, K. Collective action and revenue generation: focus on selected Metropolitan and Municipal Assemblies in Ghana. SN Soc Sci 3, 117 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s43545-023-00704-9
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s43545-023-00704-9