‘We are not the ones to blame’: Stakeholders’ conflicting rationalities in wetlands management in Ghana

Abstract

The relevance of wetlands has re-gained attention in the global socioecological agenda as part of the resurgence of nature-based solutions (NbS) for sustainable development. In global south contexts, the socio-ecological relevance of wetlands has not prevented their rapid depletion in ecologically sensitive areas due to reactive environmental planning and plurality of resource management systems. Despite multiple vested interests around wetlands, grounded multi-actor perspectives situating the divergent views on the planning and development of wetlands remain underexplored. Drawing on the southern perspective of conflicting rationalities, and using qualitative data gathered from Sakumono, the most threatened wetland site in the Greater Accra Region of Ghana, this paper distills the perspectives of residents, planners, wetland managers, and developers to unpack the underpinning contestations and conflictual views/interests that shape the exploitation and management of wetlands. The study highlights deeply rooted, inequitable, multiple but conflicting perspectives on the value and management of wetlands, as state agencies prioritize ecological functions, community stakeholders favor livelihood and cultural values, and the invisible hands of the political elite push to rationalize their property-driven investments as inseparable from conservation value. We argue that this plurality of divergent rationalities stifles the implementation of wetland conservation policies and engenders a developmental regime that tacitly supports unregulated real estate development while denying resource-dependent local population access to socio-ecological services.