Entrepreneurship in times of post-election riots: a case study of small business owners in Kisumu, Western Kenya

ABSTRACT

Kenya is often referred to as one of the most stable African economies with a comparatively advanced small business policy. However, it was befallen by an electoral crisis in late 2007 centring on disputed presidential election results, a crisis which many feared might return during the presidential election in 2017. This article demonstrates how small-scale entrepreneurs in the Western Kenyan city of Kisumu prepared for and fared in a difficult election period in 2017, as they drew on their experiences from ten years prior. It highlights the measures these entrepreneurs took to create security for themselves and their businesses as well as their involvement in the development of the political violence insurance, which was designed for entrepreneurs after the 2007/8 riots. These strategies point to a larger trend of stabilization in the small-scale enterprise sector in Kenya and the protection that goes along with it not only through personal but also increasingly through formal and institutionalized channels.

KEYWORDS:

• Entrepreneurship
• crisis
• post-election violence
• Kenya

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. I understand entrepreneurship as the activity of creating and running a business.

2. My dissertation project is part of the Bayreuth Academy of Advanced African Studies’ subproject, ‘Middle classes on the rise: Concepts of the future among freedom, consumption, tradition, and morals’. It is part of a broader project entitled ‘Future Africa – Visions in Time’, funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research.

3. Kenyan Indians or Kenyan Asians, as the Kenyan census of 2009 lists them, number roughly 47,000 (https://web.archive.org/web/20131121153548/http://www.knbs.or.ke/censusethnic.php, accessed 31 August 2017). A notable number of them came to Kisumu with the construction of the railway line from Mombasa to Lake Victoria, passing through Kisumu. Today, many are involved in medium-sized hardware and wholesale businesses (Omenya, 2013).

4. This anger had deeper roots than the rigged election and centred around questions of disputed land ownership, cf. Human Rights Watch (2008, pp. 12–15).

5. This interview was conducted by my colleague Lena Kroeker in the course of her research on social security mechanisms of the middle class in Kisumu. I am grateful to her for making this interview available to me as well as establishing contact with the insurance salesman.

6. ATI was launched as a joint initiative of seven African countries and, with the support of the World Bank, as a means to reduce business risk and thereby increase foreign investment in Africa (http://www.ati-aca.org/index.php/about-ati/overview-10601, accessed 15 August 2017).

7. Kenya’s Micro and Small Enterprises Act of 2012 defines as micro enterprises those with 0–9 employees, as small those with 10–49 employees and as medium those with 50–99 employees. Additionally, annual turnover is taken into consideration (Kenya National Bureau of Statistics, 2016, pp. 6, 10).

8. Other insurance schemes mentioned less than 5 times were funeral insurance, life and personal accident coverage. Of my interlocutors, 3 were Kenyan Indians so my data does not suffice to assert any difference in insurance behaviour.

9. In Kenya, restaurants are colloquially referred to as hotels, although their main function is serving food and they do not necessarily offer accommodation.

10. In Kisumu, most of these are owned by Kenyan Indians.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Maike Voigt

Maike Voigt worked as research associate with the Bayreuth Academy of Advanced African Studies. Since April 2016 she is a junior fellow in social anthropology at the Bayreuth International Graduate School of African Studies. She receives a doctoral scholarship from the Studienstiftung des deutschen Volkes since May 2017. Her research interests are entrepreneurship, social mobility and the middle classes in Africa. Her regional focus is on Kenya.