Beyond the Megaproject: Chinese Private Firms in West Africa

In this conversation, Dr. Elisa Gambino (University of Manchester) takes us inside the everyday reality of Chinese business activity across West Africa, from wholesale markets and retail malls to factories, construction sites, and informal trade networks.

Based on more than two years of fieldwork in Ghana, Togo, and Kenya, she explains how Chinese private companies operate on the ground and how African workers and local governments negotiate with them.

 

 The discussion explores:

• Chinese retail networks and “China malls” across African cities

• labor relations inside factories and infrastructure projects

• geolocation mapping and ethnographic methods used to track Chinese businesses

• how Chinese firms adapt to local political and economic environments

• regional trade networks linking Africa, China, and Europe

• the role of African agency in shaping these economic relationships

• why many important spillover effects never appear in official investment data

 

The interview also raises a broader question: how should we study “Global China” when so much of it happens through small private firms, local negotiations, and informal commercial networks rather than headline megaprojects?