Role of indigenous entrepreneurs and the state in Kenyan industrial development

ThesisThesis, Queen's University, 199

A disruptive ethnography of Tanzanian-Indians

This paper is a disruptive ethnography of Indians in Tanzania (Tanzanian-Indians). It uses narratives of individuals to challenge the popular ethnographic categories within which the individuals are usually subsumed. This paper analyses three critical questions concerning Category, Homeland and Community. Is the category Mhindi (‘Indian’ in Kiswahili) exhaustive as a cultural identity? What is the relationship of Tanzanian-Indians to their ‘homeland’ India? Does a community-based approach map on to the realities of everyday lives of Tanzanian-Indians? The focus will be on Zanzibar and Dar es Salaam. Both these neighbouring places have significant Indian presence and through ethnographic research using conversations, semi-structured interviews and the self-presentation of individuals through temples, mosques and clubs, we highlight the diversity of experience that lies behind the specific identity category of Mhindi

Varieties of Capitalists? The Middle–Class, Private Sector and Economic Outcomes in Africa

Political scientists have generally seen two key features of African political economies - a relatively small or absent middle class, and a middle class that is unusually embedded in the state - as key explanations of the troubled political and economic trajectories of many African societies. This paper considers the nature and implications of recent momentous changes for Africa's political economies. It asks if there is such a thing as a homogenous and universal middle class, what its attributes and role are, and how these connect to the trajectory of the broader political economy