Abdul-Gafaru Abdulai

Abdul-Gafaru Abdulai

Abdul-Gafaru Abdulai is an Associate Professor in the Department of Public Administration at the University of Ghana Business School, and an Honorary Research Fellow at the Global Development Institute, University of Manchester, UK.  He holds a First Class Bachelor’s degree in Political Science from the University of Ghana, an MPhil in Development Studies from the University of Cambridge, and a PhD in Development Policy and Management from the University of Manchester.  He has carried out a series of commissioned research for a number of international development agencies and research institutions, including UNICEF, the World Bank, DFID, UNU-WIDER, the ILO, the Overseas Development Institute (London), and the Effective States and Inclusive Development Research Centre (Manchester). His research focuses on the intersection between politics and development, with particular focus on natural resource governance, spatial inequalities, and social protection. Other research interests include urban governance, public sector reforms, and the politics ‘pockets of effectiveness’ in the global south. He is the co-author of Governing Extractive Industries: Politics, Histories, Ideas (Oxford University Press, 2018). His work has been published by several top-ranked international journals, including African Affairs; Politics & Policy, New Political Economy, Democratization, Development Policy Review; European Journal of Development Research; Journal of International Development; and Labour, Capital and Society. His article on the politics of Ghana’s education sector won the prestigious Gerti Hesseling Prize (2017) awarded for the best journal article by an African scholar published in an AEGIS-affiliated academic Journal. He also received the runner-up position for African Affairs’ African Author Prize in 2018. He is a member of the editorial advisory board of African Affairs, the top-ranked area studies journal in the world.