ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

We would like to express our deep gratitude to the International Development Research Centre of Canada for their funding of this research project, which made it possible for us to carry out the research. IDRC’s financial and intellectual support has been key to the many opportunities that we were given as researchers in the South and the North. IDRC’s support of this project has already resulted in a number of policy outcomes in the countries that the project teams researched. We hope that our IDRC-funded research will continue to have an impact on the development opportunities of the peoples of Ghana, Botswana, South Africa, and other African countries. We would like to thank all of the staff of IDRC for their constant support and encouragement. In particular we would like to express our very deepest gratitude to Dr. Jean-Michel Labatut, Ms. Eyra Edington, and Ms. Gisele Morin-Labatut for their inspirational support: without the guidance and encouragement of Dr. Labatut, this project would never have happened.

The opinions expressed in this book are those of the authors; IDRC bears no responsibility for them.

Donna Livingstone, Director, John King, Senior Editor, Karen Buttner, Editorial Co-ordinator and the other staff at the University of Calgary Press have been exceptionally generous with their expertise and constant guidance. We would like to thank Laura Dunham, Meghan Birnie, Gaelle Eizlini, Sherri Brown and Tacita Clarke for their many contributions to TAARN’s co-ordination centre at the University of Calgary’s Research Unit on Public Policy Studies. We would like to thank our families for their support. I especially thank Rosemary Brown and our children, Mike, Matt and Jen for their encouragement and help over the years.

We thank profoundly all of the many people who shared their wisdom with us and who helped us conduct our research: we hope this research has given you another voice to express your concerns.

Don Ray