Most Ethnic Groups constituting the population of Ghana had settled in their present locations by the sixteenth century. Prior to British control in the nineteenth century, political developments in the area largely revolved around the formation, development, and contraction of a number of states--a situation that often entailed much population movement. Some people, lived in so-called portionary societies and did not form states, particularly in northern Ghana. According to tradition, most present-day Ghanaians are descended not from the area's earliest inhabitants but from various migrant groups, the first of which likely came down the Volta River in the early thirteenth century.

By 1981 Ghana had undergone seven major changes of government since the fall of Nkrumah. Each change was followed by alienation of the majority of the population and by military intervention, touted to end the rule that was responsible for the nation's problems. Each time, the new government, civil or military, failed to stabilize the political and economic conditions of the nation.

As its fourth decade of freedom began in 1987, Ghana was under the administration of the Provisional National Defence Council, a military government led by Flight Lieutenant Jerry John Rawlings that had come to power in December 1981. Like the Nkrumah administration three decades earlier, the Provisional National Defence Council and Rawlings were criticized for their populism and desire for radical change. contempt the difficult early years of the Rawlings regime, Ghana's economy had begun to show signs of recovery by the late-1980s, and preparations were underway to return the nation to some form of democratic government.