Obeng-Odoom Franklin | University of Technology Sydney (original) (raw)
Franklin Obeng-Odoom is the Chancellor's Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the School of the Built Environment and a member of the Asia Pacific Centre for Complex Real Property Rights at the University of Technology, Sydney. His research interests are centred on the political economy of development, cities and natural resources (especifically water, oil, and land).
Franklin's doctoral work in political economy was supervised by Frank Stilwell: a well-known public intellectual and, notably, Australia's first full professor of political economy.
His current work at UTS is in agrarian political economy, which looks at inherited, imposed, and directed transformations in land and property rights. This research has additional implications relating to food security and economic development spatially and temporally.
Franklin's work has been published in a number of academic journals, including Review of African Political Economy, The Review of Black Political Economy, Review of Radical Political Economics, Review of Social Economy, and Revista de Economia Politica.
Franklin's research has generated considerable interest. It has inspired the UN to support land taxation and is mentioned in the maiden Africa Agriculture Status Report published by the Kofi Annan chaired, 'Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa'.
Franklin is the Editor of African Review of Economics and Finance and Associate Editor of Journal of Sustainable Development. He is also the Book Review Editor of Journal of International Real Estate and Construction Studies. He serves on the editorial boards of Urban Challenge (Urbani Izziv) and SAGE Open.
The recipient of a number of reputable research awards, Franklin was named a Dan David Prize Scholar in April 2010, appointed a World Social Science Fellow in January 2013, and was a finalist for the Vice Chancellor's Early Career Research Excellence Award in September 2013, among other accolades.
He has just completed studies and research on Georgist philosophy and political economy at the Henry George School of Social Science in Chicago, USA.
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Papers by Obeng-Odoom Franklin
Landed resources, property rights, and development in Africa have always been the focus of much h... more Landed resources, property rights, and development in Africa have always been the focus of much heated debates in geography and political economy more widely, but these controversies have become even more pressing now. This editorial introduction contextualises and sets the tone for Volume 37 of Geography Research Forum, which is a special issue that reconsiders these age-old debates. Specifically, this introduction provides the background to this special issue, clarifies which gaps the issue seeks to fill and how it has sought to do so, and emphasises the highlights of the special issue.
The analytical foundations of the debate about coal mining in Africa tend to be buried or sacrifi... more The analytical foundations of the debate about coal mining in Africa tend to be buried or sacrificed for the advocacy of certain policy choices centred on unhelpful binaries: 'no coal' or 'more coal'. Attempts to bridge the polarised positions – often centred on the development of renewables-contradictory because they seem to accept that both positions are accurate. Dissatisfied with these three positions, this paper revisits the coal question by seeking to develop W.S. Jevons' path-breaking treatise, The Coal Question (1906), as an analytical critique of, and alternative to, the existing state of knowledge. Jevons' work is insightful but incomplete because it is weak in its grasp of property relations in the coal industry which, in the case of Africa, are highly monopolistic. A stronger framework must view as nested the analysis of the relationship between coal and technology, the implications of the historical development of energy for the current interest in renewables and, the relationship between ecological and economic questions.
Rights-based approaches to development tend to emphasise human rights, the right to participate i... more Rights-based approaches to development tend to emphasise human rights, the right to participate in decision making, and rights to social services and goods such as water, housing, and even the city. They tend to exclude land, while land rights research tends to be focused on land law and law courts without analysing 'the right to land'. It is possible for the courts to play a key role to shape the current transformation of property relations, especially when private property appears to be failing its supposed role as a social trust but, as we show with an original institutional economics methodology, data from court cases, and results from Af-robarometer surveys, the contribution of the courts can be severely constrained. Existing approaches to contesting land grabs – centred on (a) popular protests (b) international guidelines and (c) national laws from the executive and the legislature – are inadequate without the courts, but what the courts can do is contingent on how well cases are presented, the orientation of judges, the resources of plaintiffs and, most fundamentally, the nature of their working rules.
Following the recent financial crisis, institutional economists have issued a “call” for institut... more Following the recent financial crisis, institutional economists have issued a “call” for institutionalist research on alternative financial systems. While suggestions have been forthcoming, (for example, in Volume 48, Issue 4 of the Journal of Economic Issues), most have centered on national-level innovations in advanced capitalist countries, prompting further calls for “community” and individual level anti-capitalist financial relations. With this article, we respond to such calls. We show how networks of finance in Cameroon bridge the formal/
informal dualisms in lending/savings activities. We demonstrate that any debates about whether to formalize informal financial institutions or leave them alone weaken in Cameroon because, through networks, people access both formal and informal financial institutions for different purposes and at various stages in the life of these institutions. This dynamism explains why, in spite of the growth of money markets in Cameroon, informal financial institutions have not disappeared, nor declined. In fact, they have expanded, contrary to predictions in existing new institutional economics research. While informal institutions have evolved, they have not necessarily become formal banks, microfinance, or stock markets. Rather, the informal financial institutions have adopted and adapted in terms of both lending and saving practices in a country where growing formal financialization has become the norm. Our findings challenge neoclassical and new institutional economics theories about money, credit, and the actors in the money market.
The persistent increase in the number of people working or living on the streets in Gh... more The persistent increase in the number of people working or living on the streets in Ghana, and the resulting surge in the government of Ghana's interest in urban streetism necessitate a study of the phenomenon and provide an opportunity to ascertain the recent claim by social economists that the institutional-structuralist approach to migration research is superior to the neoclassical and new economics of labour migration (NELM) approach for which limited empirical research at the urban level has been conducted. Drawing on published ethnographic studies and on a synthesis of other published existing data interpreted within the broad methodology of institutional-structuralism, the paper shows that neither the decision to migrate nor the decision to return is based on individual calculations alone. Similarly, rural poverty does not provide sufficient explanation for rural-urban migration. There are clearly push and pull factors in the process of migration, but these are institutional and structural rather than individual and household based. The experiences of migrants on streets in urban centres are diverse but most of them are underemployed rather than unemployed. Most intend to return to their origins, but whether they do so, when, and how are conditioned by the class of migrants and changing social institutions such as property rights that pertain in both the rural and urban contexts. For these reasons, policies framed around the assumptions in mainstream analysis of labour migration such as removing urban bias and enhancing rural development have merely re-enforced the process of uneven urban and regional development.
This review highlights what has been learnt from research on West Africa's oil economy, Ghana and... more This review highlights what has been learnt from research on West Africa's oil economy, Ghana and what remains to be studied. The existing knowledge about the industry is both analytical (entailing different frames of thinking, such as enclave and linkages approaches) and empirical (including in what ways is the oil resource a blessing, a curse, or both and to what extent regulations can attenuate or accentuate undesirable outcomes). The existing research shows that to probe whether there is a resource curse/blessing is to ask the question the wrong way. Instead, it is more useful to ask in what ways the oil and gas industry in Ghana driven by a fear of resource curse moulds and is moulded by institutions and aspirations. The tendency has been to emphasise the need for more economic growth and avoid state corruption. Steeped in mainstream economic management, the interest is in bolstering growth-enhancing processes, such as attenuating currency instability and expending limited revenue on social development as a right because such social expenditure is 'unsustainable'. While this emphasis can achieve the important goal of stabilising the economy, it totally ignores or superficially considers the more complex ramifications of oil and gas extraction, namely the growing sphere of influence of transnational oil companies some of which have become key actors in planning, inequalities across space in terms of income and productive resources, exploitation of women, especially, and labour more generally, and ecological pillage. When the policy focal lenses are changed to emphasise these other ramifications, both the implications for and possibilities to use oil resources for social development become more clearly evident and the need to re-theorise the ramifications of oil ever more pressing. In spite of this contribution to the global energy debate, the existing body of knowledge in Ghana is weak in the sense that it lacks a careful theorisation of oil as part of the biogas-electricity-oil-gas-biofuel complex, how this complex is melded into the local/global capitalist mode of production, contradictions in the process, attempts at attenuating these contradictory processes, and how these attempts, in turn, cause different and differential experiences across the entire spectrum (up, mid, and downstream) of oil production, distribution, and consumption. To address these gaps, this article briefly describes several new approaches that could be used to bolster theorisation of the oil and gas industry.
Many Ghanaians believe that introducing multi-party elections at the metropolitan, municipal and ... more Many Ghanaians believe that introducing multi-party elections at the metropolitan, municipal and district levels would ensure the election of competent people to manage the urban or local economy. This belief is premised on the assumption that electorates are informed and would vote for competent politicians. Using the 2008 elections in Ghana, it is argued that only a minority of electorates vote on issues; the majority vote along tribal and party lines; and based on how "humble" a politician is or simply based on monetocracy. This means that introducing elections into the local government system would not necessarily lead to a transformation of the local or urban economy; greater local democracy is not the answer to the housing problem, sanitation crisis, unemployment burden and the poverty challenge. There may be the need for a new form of local democracy.
International Journal of Urban Sustainable Development, 2010
Car usage in Ghana is growing at an alarming rate. Logically, a growth in total number of cars mu... more Car usage in Ghana is growing at an alarming rate. Logically, a growth in total number of cars must be because either (a) population is increasing or (b) car ownership per capita is rising or both. However, these do not sufficiently explain the increasing car population in Ghana. The article argues that the high demand for mobility in the country
This Viewpoint article draws on the doctrine of eminent domain (or compulsory purchase) as an ana... more This Viewpoint article draws on the doctrine of eminent domain (or compulsory purchase) as an analytical framework to analyse the regional and local impacts of a new source of oil. Sekondi-Takoradi, an oil city located in Ghana, West Africa, is used as a case study to explore the differentiated experiences of local people. The article shows that, although there are
Review of African Political Economy, 2011
Increasing urbanisation, wealth and ill health in cities necessitate careful study, especially in... more Increasing urbanisation, wealth and ill health in cities necessitate careful study, especially in African cities whose development is widely regarded as rapid and chaotic. Using Ghanaian cities as a case study, this article analyses some of the important sources of ill health, identifies why they persist, and assesses how they impinge on economic growth, redistribution, and poverty reduction. It argues that, although there is considerable evidence that policy change is urgently needed, the tensions and contradictions between economic and social efficiency, intermeshed with vested political interests, are likely to impede significant changes to the status quo.
Journal of Developing Societies, 2011
In order to develop effective policies to improve conditions for people working in the informal s... more In order to develop effective policies to improve conditions for people working in the informal sector of the economy, it is crucial to understand how that sector arises, operates, and relates to the state. This article analyses the informal sector in Ghana from this perspective, drawing insight from a wide range of sources such as radio and newspaper accounts to
The aggressive marketing of cities to attract private finance and capital is one important aspect... more The aggressive marketing of cities to attract private finance and capital is one important aspect of municipal neoliberalism. Urban marketing, as it is called, is said to be the the surest way to deliver urban economic development. Using a political-economic framework, this paper provides an alternative analysis of urban marketing, and highlights other avenues for addressing the urban question.
Journal of Higher Education Policy and Management, 2012
It has become commonplace for scholars and education managers to talk of the globalisation of hig... more It has become commonplace for scholars and education managers to talk of the globalisation of higher education. How to provide housing for the growing numbers of international students, however, remains contentious. This paper presents the situation in Australia by analysing the results of two large surveys and official reports published by student associations, housing authorities, the University of Sydney, and the Australian Government Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations. It shows that the authorities have not succeeded in providing an answer to the international student housing question. In turn, accommodation remains a difficult issue for most international students and threatens to undermine the quality of higher education. Understood only as an accommodation problem, it may be argued that the situation could be improved if more affordable student housing was provided. However, this paper argues that until the problem is framed in socio-economic terms and analysed from a broad perspective, a solution will remain elusive.
... Anaman, Kwabena Asomanin and Charity Osei-Amponsah (2007) 'Analysis of t... more ... Anaman, Kwabena Asomanin and Charity Osei-Amponsah (2007) 'Analysis of the Causality Links between the Growth of the Construction Industry ... Friedman, Milton and R. Friedman (1980) 'The Power of the Market', in Frank JB Stilwell and George Argyrous (eds.) Readings in ...
Landed resources, property rights, and development in Africa have always been the focus of much h... more Landed resources, property rights, and development in Africa have always been the focus of much heated debates in geography and political economy more widely, but these controversies have become even more pressing now. This editorial introduction contextualises and sets the tone for Volume 37 of Geography Research Forum, which is a special issue that reconsiders these age-old debates. Specifically, this introduction provides the background to this special issue, clarifies which gaps the issue seeks to fill and how it has sought to do so, and emphasises the highlights of the special issue.
The analytical foundations of the debate about coal mining in Africa tend to be buried or sacrifi... more The analytical foundations of the debate about coal mining in Africa tend to be buried or sacrificed for the advocacy of certain policy choices centred on unhelpful binaries: 'no coal' or 'more coal'. Attempts to bridge the polarised positions – often centred on the development of renewables-contradictory because they seem to accept that both positions are accurate. Dissatisfied with these three positions, this paper revisits the coal question by seeking to develop W.S. Jevons' path-breaking treatise, The Coal Question (1906), as an analytical critique of, and alternative to, the existing state of knowledge. Jevons' work is insightful but incomplete because it is weak in its grasp of property relations in the coal industry which, in the case of Africa, are highly monopolistic. A stronger framework must view as nested the analysis of the relationship between coal and technology, the implications of the historical development of energy for the current interest in renewables and, the relationship between ecological and economic questions.
Rights-based approaches to development tend to emphasise human rights, the right to participate i... more Rights-based approaches to development tend to emphasise human rights, the right to participate in decision making, and rights to social services and goods such as water, housing, and even the city. They tend to exclude land, while land rights research tends to be focused on land law and law courts without analysing 'the right to land'. It is possible for the courts to play a key role to shape the current transformation of property relations, especially when private property appears to be failing its supposed role as a social trust but, as we show with an original institutional economics methodology, data from court cases, and results from Af-robarometer surveys, the contribution of the courts can be severely constrained. Existing approaches to contesting land grabs – centred on (a) popular protests (b) international guidelines and (c) national laws from the executive and the legislature – are inadequate without the courts, but what the courts can do is contingent on how well cases are presented, the orientation of judges, the resources of plaintiffs and, most fundamentally, the nature of their working rules.
Following the recent financial crisis, institutional economists have issued a “call” for institut... more Following the recent financial crisis, institutional economists have issued a “call” for institutionalist research on alternative financial systems. While suggestions have been forthcoming, (for example, in Volume 48, Issue 4 of the Journal of Economic Issues), most have centered on national-level innovations in advanced capitalist countries, prompting further calls for “community” and individual level anti-capitalist financial relations. With this article, we respond to such calls. We show how networks of finance in Cameroon bridge the formal/
informal dualisms in lending/savings activities. We demonstrate that any debates about whether to formalize informal financial institutions or leave them alone weaken in Cameroon because, through networks, people access both formal and informal financial institutions for different purposes and at various stages in the life of these institutions. This dynamism explains why, in spite of the growth of money markets in Cameroon, informal financial institutions have not disappeared, nor declined. In fact, they have expanded, contrary to predictions in existing new institutional economics research. While informal institutions have evolved, they have not necessarily become formal banks, microfinance, or stock markets. Rather, the informal financial institutions have adopted and adapted in terms of both lending and saving practices in a country where growing formal financialization has become the norm. Our findings challenge neoclassical and new institutional economics theories about money, credit, and the actors in the money market.
The persistent increase in the number of people working or living on the streets in Gh... more The persistent increase in the number of people working or living on the streets in Ghana, and the resulting surge in the government of Ghana's interest in urban streetism necessitate a study of the phenomenon and provide an opportunity to ascertain the recent claim by social economists that the institutional-structuralist approach to migration research is superior to the neoclassical and new economics of labour migration (NELM) approach for which limited empirical research at the urban level has been conducted. Drawing on published ethnographic studies and on a synthesis of other published existing data interpreted within the broad methodology of institutional-structuralism, the paper shows that neither the decision to migrate nor the decision to return is based on individual calculations alone. Similarly, rural poverty does not provide sufficient explanation for rural-urban migration. There are clearly push and pull factors in the process of migration, but these are institutional and structural rather than individual and household based. The experiences of migrants on streets in urban centres are diverse but most of them are underemployed rather than unemployed. Most intend to return to their origins, but whether they do so, when, and how are conditioned by the class of migrants and changing social institutions such as property rights that pertain in both the rural and urban contexts. For these reasons, policies framed around the assumptions in mainstream analysis of labour migration such as removing urban bias and enhancing rural development have merely re-enforced the process of uneven urban and regional development.
This review highlights what has been learnt from research on West Africa's oil economy, Ghana and... more This review highlights what has been learnt from research on West Africa's oil economy, Ghana and what remains to be studied. The existing knowledge about the industry is both analytical (entailing different frames of thinking, such as enclave and linkages approaches) and empirical (including in what ways is the oil resource a blessing, a curse, or both and to what extent regulations can attenuate or accentuate undesirable outcomes). The existing research shows that to probe whether there is a resource curse/blessing is to ask the question the wrong way. Instead, it is more useful to ask in what ways the oil and gas industry in Ghana driven by a fear of resource curse moulds and is moulded by institutions and aspirations. The tendency has been to emphasise the need for more economic growth and avoid state corruption. Steeped in mainstream economic management, the interest is in bolstering growth-enhancing processes, such as attenuating currency instability and expending limited revenue on social development as a right because such social expenditure is 'unsustainable'. While this emphasis can achieve the important goal of stabilising the economy, it totally ignores or superficially considers the more complex ramifications of oil and gas extraction, namely the growing sphere of influence of transnational oil companies some of which have become key actors in planning, inequalities across space in terms of income and productive resources, exploitation of women, especially, and labour more generally, and ecological pillage. When the policy focal lenses are changed to emphasise these other ramifications, both the implications for and possibilities to use oil resources for social development become more clearly evident and the need to re-theorise the ramifications of oil ever more pressing. In spite of this contribution to the global energy debate, the existing body of knowledge in Ghana is weak in the sense that it lacks a careful theorisation of oil as part of the biogas-electricity-oil-gas-biofuel complex, how this complex is melded into the local/global capitalist mode of production, contradictions in the process, attempts at attenuating these contradictory processes, and how these attempts, in turn, cause different and differential experiences across the entire spectrum (up, mid, and downstream) of oil production, distribution, and consumption. To address these gaps, this article briefly describes several new approaches that could be used to bolster theorisation of the oil and gas industry.
Many Ghanaians believe that introducing multi-party elections at the metropolitan, municipal and ... more Many Ghanaians believe that introducing multi-party elections at the metropolitan, municipal and district levels would ensure the election of competent people to manage the urban or local economy. This belief is premised on the assumption that electorates are informed and would vote for competent politicians. Using the 2008 elections in Ghana, it is argued that only a minority of electorates vote on issues; the majority vote along tribal and party lines; and based on how "humble" a politician is or simply based on monetocracy. This means that introducing elections into the local government system would not necessarily lead to a transformation of the local or urban economy; greater local democracy is not the answer to the housing problem, sanitation crisis, unemployment burden and the poverty challenge. There may be the need for a new form of local democracy.
International Journal of Urban Sustainable Development, 2010
Car usage in Ghana is growing at an alarming rate. Logically, a growth in total number of cars mu... more Car usage in Ghana is growing at an alarming rate. Logically, a growth in total number of cars must be because either (a) population is increasing or (b) car ownership per capita is rising or both. However, these do not sufficiently explain the increasing car population in Ghana. The article argues that the high demand for mobility in the country
This Viewpoint article draws on the doctrine of eminent domain (or compulsory purchase) as an ana... more This Viewpoint article draws on the doctrine of eminent domain (or compulsory purchase) as an analytical framework to analyse the regional and local impacts of a new source of oil. Sekondi-Takoradi, an oil city located in Ghana, West Africa, is used as a case study to explore the differentiated experiences of local people. The article shows that, although there are
Review of African Political Economy, 2011
Increasing urbanisation, wealth and ill health in cities necessitate careful study, especially in... more Increasing urbanisation, wealth and ill health in cities necessitate careful study, especially in African cities whose development is widely regarded as rapid and chaotic. Using Ghanaian cities as a case study, this article analyses some of the important sources of ill health, identifies why they persist, and assesses how they impinge on economic growth, redistribution, and poverty reduction. It argues that, although there is considerable evidence that policy change is urgently needed, the tensions and contradictions between economic and social efficiency, intermeshed with vested political interests, are likely to impede significant changes to the status quo.
Journal of Developing Societies, 2011
In order to develop effective policies to improve conditions for people working in the informal s... more In order to develop effective policies to improve conditions for people working in the informal sector of the economy, it is crucial to understand how that sector arises, operates, and relates to the state. This article analyses the informal sector in Ghana from this perspective, drawing insight from a wide range of sources such as radio and newspaper accounts to
The aggressive marketing of cities to attract private finance and capital is one important aspect... more The aggressive marketing of cities to attract private finance and capital is one important aspect of municipal neoliberalism. Urban marketing, as it is called, is said to be the the surest way to deliver urban economic development. Using a political-economic framework, this paper provides an alternative analysis of urban marketing, and highlights other avenues for addressing the urban question.
Journal of Higher Education Policy and Management, 2012
It has become commonplace for scholars and education managers to talk of the globalisation of hig... more It has become commonplace for scholars and education managers to talk of the globalisation of higher education. How to provide housing for the growing numbers of international students, however, remains contentious. This paper presents the situation in Australia by analysing the results of two large surveys and official reports published by student associations, housing authorities, the University of Sydney, and the Australian Government Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations. It shows that the authorities have not succeeded in providing an answer to the international student housing question. In turn, accommodation remains a difficult issue for most international students and threatens to undermine the quality of higher education. Understood only as an accommodation problem, it may be argued that the situation could be improved if more affordable student housing was provided. However, this paper argues that until the problem is framed in socio-economic terms and analysed from a broad perspective, a solution will remain elusive.
... Anaman, Kwabena Asomanin and Charity Osei-Amponsah (2007) 'Analysis of t... more ... Anaman, Kwabena Asomanin and Charity Osei-Amponsah (2007) 'Analysis of the Causality Links between the Growth of the Construction Industry ... Friedman, Milton and R. Friedman (1980) 'The Power of the Market', in Frank JB Stilwell and George Argyrous (eds.) Readings in ...