Exploring young residential care leavers’ participation in care leaving decisions in Ghana: An interpretive analysis using Hart’s ladder of participation

• This is the first study that seeks to explore care leaving experiences in Ghana from the perspective of young, adolescent care leavers. • The proliferation of policies on children’s right to participation does not reflect the reality of care leavers and vulnerable children in child protection settings. • Ghanaian care leavers are not meaningfully engaged in care leaving decisions as their voices are not heard, and the final decisions do not reflect their wishes and best interests. • Care leavers in Ghana lay at the lowest rungs of Hart’s ladder, where their voices are tokenized or manipulated. • There is the need for intentional and concerted efforts to include children’s voices in all child protection decisions, especially care leaving, in Ghana Each year, a significant number of children transition out of residential care in Ghana into family-based or other viable settings. This transition is often challenging, as care leavers encounter considerable economic, relational, educational, and employment difficulties that affect their well-being and post-care outcomes. In Ghana, inadequate preparation for leaving care, limited aftercare support, and weak welfare systems exacerbate these vulnerabilities compared to care leavers in other countries. Meaningful participation in planning for leaving care has been shown globally to strengthen self-efficacy, self-esteem, and young people’s sense of agency. However, little is known about how care leavers in Ghana experience participation in such decisions. This qualitative study explores the involvement of young residential care leavers in decisions about their departure from care, using semi-structured interviews with ten participants and Hart’s Ladder of Participation as an analytic lens. Findings indicate that despite Ghana’s commitments under the UNCRC and related national policies, care leavers’ participatory rights are often neglected in practice. Participants described feeling excluded from key decisions, with their views frequently overlooked or manipulated, positioning them at the lowest levels of the participation ladder. This study highlights the gap between policy and practice and emphasizes the need for more inclusive approaches that recognise care leavers as active partners in planning and decisions around their transition out of care.