Based on a large number of interviews and a study of available documentation, but undertaken in the middle of the preparation period, this study assesses Ghana’s PRSP processes, paying particular attention to their likely influence on the institutionalisation of poverty reduction in the country’s political economy. After examining contextual factors, it analyses the strengths and weaknesses of the GPRS processes, including the responses of donors and the extent to which the GPRS will result from wider consultation and participation. We also examine its monitoring and information aspects. Judgements arrived at are necessarily provisional, since the process is still under way and a first incomplete draft of the GPRS had only just been prepared.