Previous page | New search |
The free AfricaBib App for Android is available here
Periodical article | Leiden University catalogue | WorldCat |
Title: | Transforming Tax Administration in Ghana: The Tension between Computers and Human Agency |
Author: | Tettey, Wisdom J. |
Year: | 1997 |
Periodical: | Development Policy Review |
Volume: | 15 |
Issue: | 4 |
Period: | December |
Pages: | 339-356 |
Language: | English |
Geographic term: | Ghana |
Subjects: | automation tax administration tariffs Economics and Trade Politics and Government Labor and Employment |
External link: | https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-7679.00041 |
Abstract: | The Ghanaian government decided, as part of the World Bank-funded Economic Management Support (EMS) Project, to promote reforms in tax structure and policy, to strengthen tax administration, and to ensure effective utilization of computerized systems. This article analyses the computerization and related components of the EMS Project in one of Ghana's two tax-collecting institutions, namely, the Customs, Excise and Preventive Service (CEPS). Particularly, the paper analyses the specific problems of customs administration in Ghana and the efforts being made to address them through the Automated System for Customs Data (Asycuda). Asycuda is part of a UN project aimed at helping member countries improve their information processing capabilities. However, the system is not particularly tailored to the organizational needs and circumstances of the CEPS. The CEPS is plagued by a number of internal organizational, sociocultural and political constraints, as well as external impediments that make it difficult to realize the full potentials of any technological infusion. The CEPS's failure to achieve the expected benefits in performance is due, partly, to the fact that the technologies were developed with assumptions which are embedded in a Western culture that is different from that obtaining in Ghana. Bibliogr., ref. |