Philanthropy as Image Politics in Ghana’s New Churches
Main Article Content
Keywords
Ghana, New Churches, Prosperity, Theology, Philanthropic Actions, Mimetic Isomorphism
Abstract
Ghana’s new Pentecostal-charismatic churches are budding in charitable deeds and parade such humanitarian intervention publicly, some via TV channels. Based on in-depth interviews with spokespersons of Christian Action Faith Ministries International (Action Chapel) and International Central Gospel Church (ICGC), as well as the observation of the churches’ philanthropic actions in the Ghanaian public sphere, the study argues that such actions of the Pentecostal-charismatic churches constitute mimetic isomorphism in relation to the historic churches. The philanthropy of the new churches augments their public image while “Prosperity Theology” drives the churches’ growth in material wealth.
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References
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Weber, Max. "On Charisma and Institution-Building." In Selected Papers, edited and with an introduction by Shmuel Noah Eisenstadt, pp. 46-65. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1968.
Whitfield, Lindsay. "Trustees on Development from Conditionality to Governance: Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers in Ghana." Journal of Modern African Studies, Vol. 43, No. 4, pp. 641-664, 2005. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022278X05001254
Bryman, Alan. Social Research Methods. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008.
Christian Health Association of Ghana (CHAG). Annual Report 2015. Accra: Christian Health Association of Ghana, 2015.
Coleman, Simon. "The Charismatic Gift." Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, Vol.10, pp. 421 - 44, 2004.
https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9655.2004.00196.x
Royalhouse Chapel International. "Happy 30th Wedding Anniversary." Daily Graphic, September 26, 2016.
Daily Graphic, September 26, 2016, p. 3.
Darkwah, Akosua Keseboa. "Aid or Hindrance? Faith Gospel Theology and Ghana's Incorporation into the Global Economy." Ghana Studies Vol. 4, pp. 7-29, 2001. https://doi.org/10.3368/gs.4.1.7
De Witte, Marleen. "Altar Media's Living Word: Televised Charismatic Christianity in Ghana." Journal of Religion in Africa Vol. 33, No. 2, 172-202, 2003. https://doi.org/10.1163/15700660360703132
Dimaggio, Paul Joseph and Walter Woody Powell. "The iron cage revisited: Institutional isomorphism and collective rationality in organizational fields." American Sociological Review Vol. 48, No. 2, pp. 147 - 160, 1983. https://doi.org/10.2307/2095101
Ghana Statistical Service. 2010 Population & Housing Census: Summary Report of Final Results. Accra: Sakoa Press Limited, 2012.
Gifford, Paul. Ghana's New Christianity: Pentecostalism in a Globalizing African Economy. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2004.
Gifford, Paul. "The Comples Provenance of Some Elements of African Pentecostal Theology." In Between Babel and Pentecost: Transnational Pentecostalism in Africa and Latin America, edited by André Corten and Ruth Marshall-Frantani, pp. 62-79. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2001.
Gifford, Paul. African Christianity: Its Public Role. Bloomington: Indiana University Press,1998.
Gifford, Paul. "Ghana's Charismatic Churches." Journal of Religion in Africa Vol. 24, No. 3, pp. 241-265, 1994. https://doi.org/10.2307/1581301
Hastings, Adrian. The Church in Africa, 1450-1950. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1994.
Hasu, Päivi. "World bank and Heavenly Bank in Poverty and Prosperity: The Case of Tanzanian Faith Gospel." Review of African Political Economy Vol. 110, pp. 679 - 92, 2006. https://doi.org/10.1080/03056240601119257
Hawley, Amos. "Human Ecology." In International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, edited by David Lawrence Sills, pp. 328-37. New York: Macmillan, 1968.
Lindhardt, Martin. "More Than Just Money: The Faith Gospel and Occult Economies in Contemporary Tanzania." Nova Religio: The Journal of Alternative and Emergent Religions Vol.13, No. 1, pp 41-67, 2009. https://doi.org/10.1525/nr.2009.13.1.41
Lindsay, Michael David and Wuthnow, Robert. "Financing Faith: Religion and Strategic Philanthropy." Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion Vol. 49, No. 1, pp. 87-111, 2010. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-5906.2009.01494.x
Martin, David. Pentecostalism: The World Is Their Parish. Oxford: Blackwell, 2001. https://doi.org/10.1177/096673690100901802
Maxwell, David. "Delivered from the Spirit of Poverty? Pentecostalism, Prosperity and Modernity in Zimbabwe." Journal of Religion in Africa 28, no. 3 1998: 350 - 73. https://doi.org/10.2307/1581574
Okyerefo, Michael Perry Kweku. "The role of Pentecostal Churches as an influential arm of Civil Society in Ghana." Ghana Social Science Journal Vol. 11, No. 2, pp. 77-101, 2014b. https://doi.org/10.1353/ghs.2008.0003
Okyerefo, Michael Perry Kweku. "Transnational dynamics in African Christianity: How global is the Lighthouse Chapel International missionary mandate?" Journal of Africana Religions Vol. 2, No. 1, pp. 95-110, 2014a. https://doi.org/10.5325/jafrireli.2.1.0095
Okyerefo, Michael Perry Kweku. "The Gospel of Public Image in Ghana." In Christianity and Public Culture in Africa, edited by Harri Englund, pp. 204-216. Ohio: Ohio University Press, 2011.
Okyerefo, Michael Perry Kweku. "'Ausländer!': Pentecostalism as social capital network for Ghanaians in Vienna." Ghana Studies Vol. 11, pp. 77-103, 2008. https://doi.org/10.1353/ghs.2008.0003
Overå, Ragnhild. "When men do women's work: structural adjustment, unemployment and changing gender relations in the informal economy of Accra, Ghana." Journal of Modern African Studies Vol. 45, No. 4, pp. 539-563, 2007.https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022278X0700287X
van de Walle, Nicolas. African Economies and the Politics of Permanent Crisis, 1979-1999. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2001.https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511800344
Weber, Max. "On Charisma and Institution-Building." In Selected Papers, edited and with an introduction by Shmuel Noah Eisenstadt, pp. 46-65. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1968.
Whitfield, Lindsay. "Trustees on Development from Conditionality to Governance: Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers in Ghana." Journal of Modern African Studies, Vol. 43, No. 4, pp. 641-664, 2005. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022278X05001254
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Sep 30, 2024
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Philanthropy as Image Politics in Ghana’s New Churches. (2024). Utambuzi: Journal for the Study of the Religions of Africa and Its Diaspora, 4(1), 99-112. https://journals.uj.ac.za/index.php/ujsrad/article/view/3403
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How to Cite
Philanthropy as Image Politics in Ghana’s New Churches. (2024). Utambuzi: Journal for the Study of the Religions of Africa and Its Diaspora, 4(1), 99-112. https://journals.uj.ac.za/index.php/ujsrad/article/view/3403