Hard Borders, Soft States: Ghana’s Security Dilemma and the Concept of ‘Permeable Protection’ in the Sahelian Spillover Era

Abstract

Ghana’s proximity to insurgency in Burkina Faso raises a puzzle: why do formal commitments to territorial security coexist with reports of cross-border militant logistics and comparatively limited large-scale attacks on Ghanaian targets? This article proposes “permeable protection” as an analytical lens, not an established Ghanaian doctrine for examining that tension. It combines a structured comparison of official policy, independent field research and the Ghanaian government’s response to allegations of tacit accommodation with a reproducible, exploratory analysis of World Bank annual military, health and education expenditure shares for 2010–2022 (13 observations). Clingendael’s 2024 report identified 40 suspected extremist-linked activity records since 2015, including 28 since 2022; however, the report’s underlying event file is not public, and the records do not constitute independently reconstructed annual attack totals. The original manuscript’s kidnapping and arrest series were therefore withdrawn. Reconstructed fiscal regressions do not support the earlier claim that military expenditure displaced social spending: military and health expenditure shares were essentially uncorrelated (r = .059; p = .849), while the education association was positive (r = .618; conventional p = .024) and not robust to HC3 standard errors (p = .075). The findings support careful differentiation between documented border threats, contested claims about state intent and non-causal budget associations. Policy implications emphasise transparent security governance, community engagement and stronger fiscal data rather than presuming a deliberate non-aggression strategy.