Bodybuilders as Vigilantes and Vigilantes as Perpetrators of Election Violence: True?

In Sub-Saharan Africa, bodybuilders have been demonized as Vigilantes who are not violence averse, and who cause election violence. The situation is more complex and does not provide a straight forward cause and effect approach. This is an investigation into the relationship between bodybuilding and political party vigilantism and the role these actors play in election violence. The author used mixed methodology of analytical literature review and ethnographical investigative tool. Observer-Participant studied 16 bodybuilders in an Accra City Gym to determine if bodybuilding predisposes one to Political Party Vigilantism and consequently to election violence. Prom-pted by the generally known fact that some recreational and professional ath-letes’ use Anabolic-Androgenic Steroids, AAS for performance enhancement and image improvement, the association between AAS and increased aggression and violence was reviewed (Hoskin & Ellis, 2015). The investigation appears to suggest that the national media may be justified for painting some bodybuilders as testosterone driven, thrill seekers who morph into vigilante groups with the propensity for violence (Beaver et al., 2008; Piacentico, Kot-zalidis, del Casale et al., 2015). This finding was not sustained by other researchers (Bahsin, Storer, Berman et al., 1996; Yates et al., 1999). In the national situation, the youth appear to use bodybuilding as part of their health-seeking needs, although there are aspects of bodybuilding that may not contribute to overall good health, such as the injection of steroids for muscle mass. Those recruited into Political Party Vigilante Groups join through


Introduction
Writing about the sport of bodybuilding in the United States of America, Cortese (2014) cited two pieces of literature that seem to underscore the perceived violence associated with bodybuilding even in Ghana. Granted, all the referenced papers were about the perception of the sport, the use and abuse of AAS in the Western Industrialized nations and not about bodybuilders as members of vigilante groups in a middle income nation such as Ghana. He cited that, "we are entering a golden age of drug development. The use of… substances in athletics will grow proportionately…. It will be… critical… both medically and philosophically" (Wu & von Eckardstein, 2003;Cortese, 2014). He added that "you cannot hold a comprehensive discussion about bodybuilding without talking about the use of anabolic steroids and other performance-enhancing drugs (Phillips, 1997(Phillips, , 2004Cortese, 2014). Although the topic for this paper is about the demonization of bodybuilders specifically in Ghana and in Sub-Saharan Africa generally, it was necessary to discuss the sub-culture of bodybuilding in relation to some of the allegations and negative conduct of some bodybuilders about which the media has reported and the public has complained.
The sport of bodybuilding is not inherently violent. To understand the reasons for the condemnation, it is important to review what researchers have found about the sport. It is because; and as reported by various researchers, "males who had used anabolic-androgenic steroids at least once in their life reported greater involvement in violent behavior compared with males who reported never using anabolic-androgenic steroids" (Beaver et al., 2008(Beaver et al., : p. 2186).
Anabolic Androgenic Steroids, AAS use has led to "evolutionary neuro-androgenic" theory, ENA (Hoskin & Ellis, 2015). ENA theorizes that "brain exposure to both prenatal and post-pubertal androgens (particularly testosterone) promotes all forms of competitiveness, including those that victimize others". Other researchers have linked exposure to fetal testosterone and other androgens prenatally may increase the probability of offending later in life (Hoskin & Ellis, 2015;Turanovic et al., 2017). Not all researchers agree with the issue of a single dose exposure to AAS leading to profound neuro-adaptive changes. Others have refuted the single dose exposure theory with "premorbid abnormal personalities or those with a history of psychiatric disorders who are attracted to AAS use" (Piacentico, Kotzalidis, del Casale et al., 2015).
Another group of researchers contributed that, a single exposure to AAS may not determine ethnic differences to the escalation or de-escalation of conflict and that "the causes of ethnic differences in criminal behavior are more compli-I. Norman DOI: 10.4236/aasoci.2019.96017 210 Advances in Applied Sociology cated than simple exposure to androgens" (Winegard & Winegard, 2018: p. 122). These apposite views are not opposite to each other, but rather add on or build on the scientific efforts to understand the effects of nonmedical "roids" (slang for steroids) use or consumption. It has been reported that some of the negative side effects of AAS include complications such as "hypertension, atherosclerosis, myocardial hypertrophy and infarction, abnormal blood clotting, hepatotoxity and psychiatric" as well as "behavioral symptoms like aggressiveness and irritability" (Stannard & Bucknell, 1993;Hartgens & Kuipers, 2004;Talih, Fattal, & Malone, 2007;Piacentico et al. 2015). Yet, there are other researchers that have reported beneficial effects from AAS, including "the treatment of HIV-related muscle wasting, muscle dystrophies, severe burn injuries, bone marrow failure, hereditary angioedema and growth retardation in children" (Gelfand, Sherins, Alling, & Frank, 1976;Ammus, 1989;Piacentico et al., 2015). How do all the research and clinical findings relate to Political Party Vigilantism and the subsequent eruption of election violence, perpetrated; often times; by men with purposely sculptured muscularity? Although there are many influential published works on various aspects of political vigilantism in Sub-Saharan Africa, for example in Tanzania (Fleisher, 2000;Abrahams, 1998;Bukurura, 1994), and in Kenya (Anderson, 1986;Fleisher, 1998) to mention but a few, there has not been direct links to bodybuilding as, probably, the "boot camp" for developing "vigilante personality" that can be energized to violent ends by soaring political party rhetoric and the promise of financial reward. It is the combination of strong looking, muscular men, who may be booted by steroids with all of its psychiatric effects and affects, to either protect ballot boxes, or stall the opposition party's advances that, raises the specter of fear and doom in the opponent and the resulting violence or clash. There are Vigilante Groups with deep affiliations with, or sponsorship of national political parties within Sub-Saharan Africa such as those of Ghana (Gyampo et al., 2017), Kenya (Kioko, 2010), South Africa (Theodore Petrus, 2015West Cape Government, Occasional Paper, 2013), and in Nigeria (Spencer & Moraro, 2017). Despite the widespread nature of the practice and the negative impact it appears to exert on the democratization process of Sub-Saharan Africa, "there is as yet no scholarly consensus on what exactly vigilantism is-especially as regards the nature of its relationship with the state" (Sederberg and Rosenbaum 1976;1974: 542). Sederberg and Rosenbaum, defined vigilantism to mean "to take the law in one's hands, a sort of do-it-yourself justice when resorting to all other established means fails". Johnston (1996: p. 222) defined vigilantism from criminological viewpoint to mean "to be alert". Vigilantes are first responders "to danger or to detect danger" (Johnston, 1996). Other researchers such as Kowalewski (1982) and Little & Sheffield (1983) defined vigilantism to mean "establishment violence", perpetrated in furtherance of "conservative" ends, and "designed to create, maintain, or recreate an established socio-political order" (Fleisher, 2000: p. 209;Norman, 2019 Staniland has offered that "electoral violence has been poorly conceptualized". That, "the term is used to refer to wildly different phenomena, from crackdowns by security forces to violence perpetrated by political parties' armed wings to insurgent targeting of politicians during campaigns. This has created a conceptual and empirical muddle that undermines explanations for the causes of "electoral violence" (Staniland, 2014: p. 100). This description applies to the situation in Ghana and in Sub-Saharan Africa in general. Staniland cautions that in addition to studying the consequences of election related violence, "scholars need to dramatically broaden how electoral violence is understood: it does not just involve rioting thugs controlled by cunning politicians, but can also include coups, insurgencies, brutal state crackdowns, and local clashes fueled by community rivalries" (Straus & Taylor, 2008;Bekoe, 2008;Staniland, 2014).
Despite such warning and instruction, the national discourse on election violence does not appear to delve into the primary causes of election violence but often scapegoats Political Party Vigilante Groups as the culprits (CODEO, 2017; National Commission for Civic Education, 2019; AG, Ghana, 2019). The shortcoming cannot be put only on the media alone, but even on departments and agencies and on the national law makers. The nation appears to view or define Vigilante Groups as bodybuilders, macho men with big muscles and big bodies, who enforce law and order for the respective parties that have such wings.
Added to the scholarly and policy confusion surrounding the perpetrators of election violence is the real fact that Ghana appears to have too many media houses and radio stations all competing for the same story, all providing nuance angles to the same story and trying to be the first in news (TV3 promo: Best in News, First in News, 2019). Such intra-media house competition is generally considered healthy for democracy, freedom of the press and speech. However, it also poses severe threat to the peace and tranquility of the nation, perhaps, much in the same way that all organizational excesses could be disruptive to the nor- Advances in Applied Sociology development and peace building at the lower echelon of society in terms of sanitation, hygiene and security, public information, entertainment and politics. Their reach, however, is not as effective in dealing with matters that concern the upper middle classes, the rich and powerful, or the information needs of those in the upper echelons of society that are self-made, or captains of industries and those within the intellectual classes, especially those in academia and in research.
When it comes to the universities and centers of learning, the moments one reads or hears about developments in those places are when there are scandals, violence or abuse of office. The Ghanaian media does not have time to investigate discoveries being made by research institutions, discoveries and publications being done by other researchers and are not even interested to talk to Principal Investigators on truly original research done in the nation. There are often no progressive or novel news about manufacturing, true new business development, no news on incubation laboratories whose works may bescalable and capable of improving job creation, or news on how access to capital can be improved. Business news is often short in duration compared to the ample time given to valueless entertainment news. Almost all television stations in Ghana present mediocre international news clips during the evening news that are not worth the spittle of the presenters. The business news is often about fraud, Ponzi schemes, cheating and dishonest managers, and doom. Such news items could have the consequential effect of disrupting national peace and development if fake or malicious (Stephanie Sullivan, personal communication, US Ambassador to Ghana, 4/2019). In the last 12 months, almost every operating television and radio station in the nation has carried a news story, discussion panel, call-ins and text-ins on the issue of bodybuilders as vigilantes or as militia. Some even label those members of the Vigilante groups that are into bodybuilding as "brainless chauvinists". Such accusations and labels are nowhere more voluble as in election related violence and agitations (CODEO, 2019;Staniland, 2014). But election violence is not the exclusive purview of bodybuilders who are vigilantes but the government and the parliamentarians as well as the general public that contribute to the often partisan national discourse in diverse ways. "Elections can fuel violence where the contestants do not follow the rules or accept the election outcome as the legitimate expression of the will of the citizenry. They are not the sole cause of pre-or postelection violence" ( They first emerged as rag-tag body-builders with no unifying ideology, purpose or interests, with brawny, street-smarts alertness and, decidedly, masculine bodies. To many admirers of such physique, the muscularity of their bodies represents youthfulness, even healthiness, but it may also represent visual intimidation, violence, and even fear (Taylor & Mensah, 2017;Cortese, 2014).
Soon thereafter this incident, on February 6, 2019, the government set up the Emile Short Commission of inquiry to investigate the developments leading up to the Ayawaso West Wuogon By-election confrontation. Its terms of reference were: "To make a full, faithful and impartial enquiry into the circumstances of, and establish the facts leading to, the events and associated violence during the Ayawaso West Wuogon by-election. To identify any person responsible for or who has been involved in the events, the associated violence and injuries. To inquire into any matter which it considers incidental or reasonably related to the causes of the events and the associated violence and injuries, and to submit within one month its report to the President, giving reasons for its findings and  , 1989;DeWalt & DeWalt, 2002). Gym visits were on weekends where most of the patrons exercised at this center. Some of the big gym facilities in Accra City have dedicated spaces for aerobics exercise, equipment for regular workout, and heavy weights section for the bodybuilders, although any club member could be in any of the sections without being barred.
The gym in the study had similar layout. A daily routine began with stretching, warm-up exercises including the use of treadmills of various kinds, and continued through light weight training. Some patrons concentrated on only aerobic exercise, which was in a different part of this gym. It was observed that a few women were involved in bodybuilding in the gym in the study, although most women visited the gym for aerobic workouts. Those found in the "heavy weights" section of the gym, were in the company of male companions, who were themselves bodybuilders. It may not have been culturally appropriate to talk to the woman, by engaging the woman on issues of training, dieting and food supplements before their companions. Due to differential training styles of men and women, which could have skewed the data due to inherent sex bias, the 16 subjects were all men. Notice that participant observational research requires a certain degree of deception (Bernard, 1994 Gym attendance was ritualistically regular, with occasional absence due to illness or family emergencies. All 16 participants visited the gym with punctuality and in earnest, except three of the subjects who were stricken by malaria and another who was away from the Gym for 2 months, due to death in his family. The Observer-Participant also missed a total of two weeks of gym attendance due to work assignments and trips outside Accra City.

Literature Search Approach
Altogether, 56 pertinent publications were reviewed for this paper spread among

Field Report from Participant Observation
The Observer-Participant ethnographically studied 16 subjects who were amateur bodybuilders over a (6) six month period in an Accra City gym between A good number of the bodybuilders were engaged in various economic activities. Some were petty traders and operators of car washing bays, mobile phone sellers, butchers, and drinking spots operators.
Although not study participants, it has been observed that more and more professional class men and women were also being attracted to the sport and, where alcoholic beverages, beer and wine were served together with food. If the athletes were using AAS or other supplements, it was done in the most private or secretive way, which a cross-sectional study may have helped to uncover. However, from conversations with several of the subjects, it was confirmed that about 24% to 50% of the bodybuilders injected steroids for muscle mass and definition.
The informants also confirmed occasionally injecting themselves with steroids for the same goals as the others. That, almost all of them used supplements, which were either locally purchased or sent to them by friends and relatives from UK and USA and from other markets. It was revealed that some of them consumed about four to six high protein meals a day particularly when preparing for national competitions, and then taper off from the use of steroids a week or so before competition as well as cut down on the amount of protein intake.

The Public Perception of Bodybuilding
Bodybuilding as a sport is both admired and derided by members of the general public, although there appears to be the general admission that the sport helps the youth to become more disciplined, particularly among university students studied at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (Taylor and Mensah, 2017). Although there is no epidemiological study of the ills or benefits of bodybuilding as a sport on a nation-wide basis in Ghana, it appears everyone has an opinion about the sport and those who practice it. Bodybuilding or body sculpturing is both an art and a health-seeking behavior, although there are those who see only the negative aspect of the sport (Taylor & Mensah, 2017).
The negativity associated with the sports partially lie with political parties, the governments, departments and agencies, the Ministry of Youth and Sport for the level of attention these pay to the sport, and largely to the bodybuilders.

Employment Opportunities and Social Networks
The statistics on youth unemployment and opportunities available to the majority of the people of many nations in Africa, Ghana not exempted, is widely accessible in many government and Internet sources. It is also famously known how difficult it is for well-established businesses in Sub-Saharan African economies to raise capital, irrespective of having great business plans, collateral or good market shares in the particular industries in which they are engaged. It is even more difficult for experienced young men and women to raise any form of capital except those they could attract from family, parents or themselves. Except for scholastic value, it makes no sense to keep repeating such data from one paper to the other (Di Tella & Schargrodsky, 2003;Easterly & Ross, 1997;Easterly, 2001Easterly, , 2007. Particularly because economic development is not the focus of this paper, this author is not going to engage in egoistical recitation of the statistical deprivation and inequities in the national or Sub-Saharan Africa's economies. By and large, the economic paradigm which is being run in most African nations today, are stacked against the upward mobility of the youth, women, the vulnerable, the politically unconnected, the religiously unconnected and the academically un-credentialed (Association of African Universities, 2017).
Although about half of the subjects studied in this paper lived in their own rented units, with another quarter owning their own homes, the others were temporarily "perching" or living with friends or family due to the lack of money to defray the cost of a two year rent advance payment for an apartment. About 70% of the subjects had jobs or were engaged in productive activities, whiles the rest were unemployed and depended on the generosity of their peer, friends, and visitors to the gym. The number that had jobs or who were engaged in productive activities, also rode motorcycles and, or drove their own cars to and fro the gym. Whether in deed the vehicles belonged to them or someone else cannot be ascertained. Of the group of bodybuilders that had no jobs and who had, perhaps, given up looking, they hanged around the gym, offered to help new comers or visitors to train, or solicited for business as private trainers from the seemingly well to do members of the Gym Clubs.
Almost all the 16 subjects talked often about becoming professional bodybuilders in the UK or the USA. Therefore, becoming an amateur bodybuilder with hopes of graduating to professional class is part of the dreams of young but economically disadvantaged men in Ghana. Bodybuilders in the UK or USA may not face the same or even similar economic challenges such as the lack of access to good but basic housing, inability to secure three square meals a day, lack of jobs or employment no matter how menial, let alone spend about $300 to $400 a year on food supplements. However, some bodybuilders in the Western Industrial economies give economic justifications why they go into bodybuilding: to  (Taylor & Mensah, 2017).
In order for some of the national bodybuilders raise capital, they avail themselves as executive body-guards, night-club bouncers, props at fashion shows, and ushers at big public events. In fact, for some of the young men engaged in bodybuilding, the motivation for the sport was to improve their chances for such engagements. Bodybuilding therefore is a type of self-help project that enables the athlete to brand himself as a product, a profit center, without engaging in vice such as male prostitution or criminal activity. The discipline learned in the gym in sculpturing their bodies is often transferred to running the type of businesses that their meagre capital can help to launch: spare parts dealerships, car washing bays, drinking spots, barbering, tailoring, and such other trades and economic activities. Those that are politically connected are able to be enrolled in the police service or the national army, sometimes, without regard to their academic abilities or achievements.
The exercise Gym is a place of bonding and socialization as well as networking. From field observations, it has been noted that many of the athletes in amateur bodybuilding have suffered or suffer from social deprivation, economic underclassness and want. At the gym they develop enabling connections and network that may help them to direct their skills into productive activities as they build up their egos and self-image.

Political Party Recruitment
It was observed among the 16 subjects in this study that they appeared to have highly developed sense of politics and political competition in Ghana. They were committed to the particular political party they were aligned with and viewed life in "we versus them" equation. Despite the fact that they appeared as ardent supporters of their political parties, they were not particularly crazy about or committed to sacrificing their lives for the life of even their most favorite politician. Collectively, bodybuilders were optimistic group of people. At least, optimism for the future was detected among those studied. They talked often about what their plans were for the future, with slogans like, "the young shall grow", "no weapon can defeat us" and "it shall be well". These are all messages of hope, and not of destruction and mayhem as some commentators have reported.
Those recruited into the reported Political Party Vigilante Groups, join through peer recommendation or pressure, Political Party affiliation, personal choice and direct employment by "strongmen and financiers" in the Political Parties as personal body-guards and party security men. They were financially sponsored by the political parties. On this concern, the report of the National really buffed, chiseled out with big biceps and triceps often got noticed very quickly if they were also naturally gifted with height and imposing structural frame. Some of those studied reported of having been co-opted into the security details of prominent national political operatives and who often travelled with such operatives to various social and official engagements.
It has also been noted that "the insatiable desire of leadership of the two major political parties to win power at all cost, resorted to using the youth groups to intimidate their opponents to achieve this desire" (National Commission for Civic Education, 2019: p. 13). This means the bigger the bodybuilder, the greater the fear or intimidation factor he exuded on the opponent. Some of the subjects in this study provided anecdotal narratives on their personal experiences to validate this observation by the NCCE and others. These groups also existed or participated in "different behaviors to maximize inclusive fitness" (Winegard & Winegard, 2018;Norman, 2019).

Bodybuilding and Links to Aggressive, Offending Behavior vis-à-vis Election Violence
In the national media and reports of other public and non-governmental institutions, it is established, though without a national empirical study that, bodybuilding strongly associate with offending behavior. That may explain why bodybuilders who are political party vigilantes tend to apply the tools of intimidation and violence for the mitigation of conflict. There is research from other places that tend to support the local assertion regarding the use of intimidation techniques by the vigilantes. In order to apply the findings of researchers in other places to the national experience, it has to be assumed that bodybuilders in Ghana, without empirical data, consume anabolic androgenic steroids as this research has found. As earlier reported, during the 6-month long ethnographical investigation, none of the 16 subjects studied was observed ever taking any supplement or drug, or pill apart from water or what appeared to be unadulterated water. It has also been reported that, perhaps, the dosing of supplements by bodybuilders in the Gym visited during the observational study do in fact, take AAS but privately in their abodes before they got to the Gym to workout. Having made these declarations, it is fair to accept the preposition that other researchers have found that "elevations in testosterone stemming from anabolic-androgenic steroid use may have purported links to aggressive and violent behaviors" (Beaver et al., 2008(Beaver et al., : p. 2185Skarberg & Engstrom, 2007;Thiblim & Parlklo, 2002;Pope, Kouri, & Hudson, 2000;Conacher & Workman, 1989). The several studies carried out among bodybuilders in Ghana did not build up to this conclusion because their foci were on renal health management and not on behavioral outcomes of bodybuilders (Taylor & Mensah, 2017). In a study among Iranian recreational bodybuilders, the authors found in a self-report of AAS abuse was registered in 16.6% of those in the study, and that "among different psy-

Conclusion
The issue of election violence coupled with youth restlessness and propensity to violence whether it is fueled by Anabolic-Androgenic Steroids, alcohol, drugs use or the soaring sermons of a religious cleric, whether in a gang, vigilante group or militia is a very scary thought for both the establishment and members of the youth. This is because all admit that the leadership of these nations, Ghana not exempted, and the adult members who were to guide the public purse, have not done their nations well in Sub-Saharan Africa. Economic hardships largely created by the leaders of these nations and the governments have forced thousands of young people to undertake perilous journeys across the desert and then over the ocean to Europe for greener pastures. Those who stay behind and who join vigilante groups, and who engage in violence of any type, though not justified, appear to have very little option by way of job opportunities. They also are victims of the perceived and real neglect of the affairs of the nation by the governments and by the adult leaderships. Those who go into bodybuilding appear desperate, and pursue any avenue that would bring them what appears to be a faux sense of fulfillment. This too is a natural outcome of unmet economic employment needs and the resulting restlessness. The finding that about 24% to 50% of the bodybuilders injected steroids for muscle mass and definition, and that almost all of the bodybuilders including those 16 study participants use supplements, should be of concern to public health authorities and policy makers in Ghana. It should be borne in mind that neither the use nor abuse of AAS, or membership in a vigilante group is the reason why there is election violence in Ghana and in Sub-Saharan African generally. There is election violence in Ghana because the adult members of the political parties appear to be on suicide mission where the "winner takes all" mentality rules, even if the rest of the nation would blow up in flames. When it comes to election violence, it appears those that need to be put in check are not the bodybuilders but the adult politicians and their hangers-on. The government and other entities should therefore refrain from demonizing bodybuilders as trouble makers, although they may have their own challenges as athletes.

Study Limitations
The use of this study is cautioned. Wishing to make this study a truly national one, and at the same time confronted with the paucity of refereed national publications, only 56 pertinent publications were reviewed for this paper most of work may explore these factors to add to the literature on Vigilante Groups and the sport of body-building as well as the use of AAS. This author wishes to disassociate from the impression that all bodybuilders use, or bodybuilding leads to the use of AAS. This paper also shows that although there appears to be established connection between AAS and violence, and psychiatric challenges, the research did not concern a national validation investigation of these phenomena.

Conflicts of Interest
The author declares no conflicts of interest regarding the publication of this paper.