Traditional Institutions and Agenda Setting: The Case of the Adoption of the Ghana Education Trust Fund

This study applies agenda setting theory mostly used to examine policymaking in western countries to understand educational policymaking inGhana. It draws on a case study on the role of the Asante TraditionalCouncil and rulers in the adoption of the Ghana Education Trust Fund(GETFund), a program that allows the public to participate in the financingof education. The study finds that the outside initiation model, consolidation,pluralist concept of policymaking, and the policy streams metaphor help toexplain agenda setting for the adoption of the GETFund program. Inparticular, it argues that the enstoolment of Otumfuo Osei Tutu II and hisactivism in championing the idea of a public participation program infinancing education was an intervening event that opened the window for aproposal centering on that idea to gain agenda entrance and the passage ofthe GETFund bill by the Parliament of Ghana in 2000. Broadly, the studyhelps to understand the role of traditional institutions and rulers in publicpolicy making in Ghana.