Wherever you go in contemporary Nairobi, you will find yourself confronted with images of economic success. Whether the suited and smiling young professionals on the Safaricom billboards, celebrating the speed of their new data bundles, the fleet of range-rovers that block the streets in the gridlock hours of commuting, or the synthetic marbled fortresses (the office towers, the luxury flats) 鈥� Nairobi鈥檚 wealth announces itself over and above the streets below: Streets of kiosks selling warm soda, vendors (鈥�Mama Mbogas鈥� 鈥� the stereotypical figure of market trader women selling vegetables and fruits from the city鈥檚 rural hinterlands), construction workers eating chapo (chapatis)on breaks; Streets of boda-boda (motorcycle) drivers talking to each other in the sun, streets of fundis (mechanics) hammering crumpled matatu minivan doors back into shape; Streets where students gather in groups outside the University of Nairobi, where aspiring politicians argue in Jevanjee Gardens. Images of wealth barely conceal inequality, the reality of the informal economy in which the majority of Kenyans work with their ingenuity and hands to accrue cash, the lifeblood of social reproduction.
Drawing on over 21 months of fieldwork conducted on the changing peri-urban peripheries of Nairobi,[1] this blog draws attention not only towards the city鈥檚 shifting landscape of urban inequality, but also desire 鈥� of aspirations for better lives, membership in a developing Kenya evoked by the visible presence of vast wealth, evident especially in the material lifestyles of the city鈥檚 nouveaux riches, whether wealthy business and political elites or the posh 鈥�mapunk鈥�, a pejorative Sheng term for those youth wealthy enough to have grown outside the ghetto. But for the Kenya鈥檚 aspirant youth, the city鈥檚 landscape of inequality is experienced not so much as a fixed condition but as a subjective and personal challenge to succeed, to 鈥榤ake it鈥� to a middle-class standard of living possessed by others. The failure to do so produces subjective experiences of stress, failure and disappointment, the product of comparison with the wealth of others. Rather than purely economic pressure, this blog seeks to foreground the mental pressures produced by this landscape of desire, and the pressure to succeed.
As the editors of this blog series write, 鈥榚conomic pressure and stress are not confined to the urban poor鈥�. Of Kenya鈥檚 鈥榟ustler masses鈥�, the 80 per cent of the country鈥檚 inhabitants who work in the informal economy. The figure of the 鈥榟ustler鈥� regularly evokes a young man, living in one of Nairobi鈥檚 informal settlements, struggling day-to-day for his immediate needs. And yet, as this brief portrait of Nairobi suggests, finer grain distinctions are possible that reveal more complex relationships with 鈥榚conomic pressure鈥� that do not simply amount to the short-term temporalities of day-to-day survival. Whilst short-term needs are hardly absent from Kenyans鈥� economic subjectivities and their careful modes of economisation, in the long-term Kenyans work hard to accumulate the wealth that affords participation in the New Kenya, and, not incidentally, status and recognition from others. Consider, for instance, the Kenyans pursuing success from such predicaments of economic uncertainty.
鈥�Lazima huu mwaka niwashangazi鈥�, sings Jaguar in his 2015 hit (This Year). 鈥楾his year I鈥檒l blow their minds!鈥�. Jaguar鈥檚 narrator is an aspirant Kenyan whose motivation is not simply self, but self in relation to others 鈥� a rural migrant who desires the status and recognition from his kinsmen and neighbours whence he returns from the city with the wealth he has won. 鈥楢 good job, a good house, a good wife鈥� (鈥�Kazi nzuri! Nyumba nzuri! Bibi nzuri!鈥�), he sings, imagining the future that lies ahead. 鈥業鈥檒l be a rich man like Sonko鈥�, he tells us, a play on words in reference to Nairobi鈥檚 now former Governor Michael Mbuvi Sonko, a man who has quite literally appropriated the term 鈥�sonko鈥�, meaning 鈥榬ich person鈥� (or sometimes 鈥榖oss鈥�). Regardless of the true origins of his wealth, his identity is one of a 鈥榟ustler鈥� who has 鈥榤ade it鈥� in life.
Such optimism recalls the now famous narrative that the African continent is 鈥榬ising鈥� 鈥� that economic growth is catapulting countries towards middle-income status, creating new middle classes able to live lives of conspicuous consumption. Since the end of Daniel arap Moi鈥檚 de facto one-party state, and the political and economic liberalisation ushered in under Kenya鈥檚 Rainbow Coalition (2002-2005), economic growth has shaped the intensification of desires for middle-class lifestyles and their material trappings.
At the same time, such narratives belie the immense economic pressure faced by Kenyans on their pathways towards prosperity. Indeed, the sheer discrepancy between piecemeal incomes (gleaned through irregular labour in Nairobi) and the pressure to succeed, gives rise to feelings of failure, shame, and distress. Such affective states readily evoke 鈥榩ressure鈥� rather than aspiration, as the authors of this series call it: 鈥榓 cognitive assessment of a real/imagined disbalance between real/imagined economic demands and the real/imagined ability to fulfil them.鈥�
Peri-urban neighbourhoods under pressure
The contradictions between material means and hopeful ends are palpably visible on the northern peri-urban outskirts of Nairobi where rural Kikuyu families have seen their lifestyles shift over the last half century from smallholder farming to full-time wage labour, supplemented by what small amount of food they can grow on their small shambas (gardens). Families turn to local towns and the nearby cities to accumulate wealth to reinvest in their homesteads. Whilst no one there would call themselves 鈥榩oor鈥� (maskini), neither would they claim to have 鈥榤ade it鈥�. 鈥榃e are somewhere鈥�, says Mwaura, the now 21-year-old son of the family I lived with throughout my doctoral fieldwork there, between January 2017 and July 2018.
In a 鈥榣ocalised patriline鈥�, where sons have inherited land from their fathers in increasingly smaller patches, people live in close proximity to their neighbour-kin. Within neighbourhoods, families find themselves competing to display the wealth they have won in the city. Many choose to invest their incomes in constructing fabulous stone houses, sometimes (according to local gossip) to the detriment of educating children. In conjunction with such pressure to display wealth, to signal one鈥檚 membership in Kenya鈥檚 new landscape of prosperity, rivalries play out within neighbourhood spaces where the success of others is keenly visible, piling further pressure on those who feel they have not 鈥榤ade it鈥�, intensifying subjective experiences of stuckness, shame, and failure.
In 2017, during a long stint stuck on his family鈥檚 small homestead during the strike action of university lecturers, Mwaura recalled the pressure his parents put on him to succeed in school. He told me how they had claimed to be the most successful students in their classes, and that the burden was on him to follow suit. But Mwaura joked about the common nature of this claim 鈥� that even his friends鈥� parents were telling them the same. 鈥楨veryone was number one, so who was number two?鈥�, he laughed. His parents were evidently proud of his success, and clearly hoped Mwaura would go on to better things. He was one of a handful of youths from the area to attend university.
In spite of Mwaura鈥檚 relative privilege, his dreams lay out of his reach. Mwaura found himself dreaming of a better life, often a life lived elsewhere, in the USA or in Dubai where he could accumulate enough wealth to live a comfortable life, one where he could live in a stone house, have a large television, earn good money and eventually provide for his own children. By contrast, by mid-2017, he had spent practically half a year 鈥榠dling鈥� on his family鈥檚 homestead, his university lecturers on strike, yet more evidence to Mwaura of Uhuru Kenyatta鈥檚 failures.
There鈥檚 this friend of mine, I did better than him in high school. He used to be my very good friend, we used to waste a lot of time together. We used to hang out a lot. After high school 鈥� right now he鈥檚 in US doing medicine and I’m in Kenya doing nothing! Man, you feel challenged. As much as he鈥檚 my friend [鈥 [PL: He鈥檚 in US?] Imagine! Maaan […]
From the pressure to succeed come comparisons between self and other. Kenyans acutely experience the gulf in economic status as a personal affront, and a personal failure. As Mwaura put it: 鈥榶ou feel challenged鈥�. His experiences speak to those of graduates across Kenya whose educations have raised their privileges. 鈥楤eing a graduate is like a curse鈥�, said Dedan (27), one of Mwaura鈥檚 neighbours who worked as a mechanic. Though he lacked university education, he recognised that his aspirations were modest relative to his income and his background. To have gone to university was to have one鈥檚 expectations for the future raised beyond all reason. 鈥楾he only thing is starting from the bottom鈥�, he said. 鈥榃e just don鈥檛 want to admit it.鈥�
Pressure in Africa 鈥� from precarity to accumulation
The experience of such gulfs between future aspirations and economic means is hardly confined to aspirant families and their university student children. As I have recently , young, low-income men from Nairobi-adjacent towns find themselves trying to 鈥榮imulate鈥� the wealth of the businessmen and politicians whose free and easy consumption they admire. The desire to dwell in wealth 鈥� temporarily, phenomenologically 鈥� even if only for a moment, marks these acts as forms of .
But such economic activity remains a weak balm for the existential despair these young men face 鈥� the knowledge that one might never 鈥榤ake it鈥�, that, in a world of low and piecemeal cash incomes, no amount of economising will ever allow one to transcend one鈥檚 status 鈥榠n the street鈥�. The 鈥榩ressure鈥� these men face is regularly articulated as a form of 鈥榮tress鈥� that must be controlled. 鈥榃e drink our stress鈥�, as one of my interlocutors put it. A range of substances are used to do so 鈥� from alcohol, to bhang, to cheap khat leaves (尘农驳农农办补) that provide short-term inspiration and focus, as well as an existential oblivion. 鈥榃e chew to make time go鈥�, Gaku, a 22-year-old on-off construction worker and youth footballer told me. He regularly spent his hours by the main thoroughfare of his home town of Chungwa, talking to his friends, waiting for a work opportunity to arise.
Clearly, 鈥榮tress鈥� amounts to short-term concerns over money. But returning to Mwaura鈥檚 discourse, I want to argue that even for youths like Gaku, a definition of 鈥榮tress鈥� can be extended to evoke not just money worries, but deeper forms of despair about a failure to achieve a good life. As Gaku鈥檚 21-year-old age-mate Cash claimed, 鈥榃hen you come back, Peter, you will find us all married, with children. We won鈥檛 be living like this anymore.鈥� The desire to become evokes not just adulthood, but the wealth required to reach it 鈥� the wealth to purchase land, to create home of one鈥檚 own, to provide for dependants. That such claims were made to me as a relative outsider speaks to their normative morality. These men claimed that one day, at least, they would become publicly recognised and upstanding persons.
If Kenyans live with aspiration as a burden, one that practically forces status competition, then it suggests that a greater focus must be placed not simply on the temporalities of uncertainties lived by people who generate their incomes in the informal economy, but on concrete aims and aspirations, and the material constraints that limit their achievement. Whilst anthropological accounts of precarity and precarious labour tend to favour a description of uncertainty itself, I suggest that my interlocutors are facing a more straightforward problem of accumulation under . In a world where accumulation is essential to accruing the signs of living a good life, pressure arises from a gulf in status that is transposed onto the difference between self and other. Such comparisons speak not only to despair, but to a terrain of envy emerging on Nairobi鈥檚 northern outskirts 鈥� under the shadow of rising aspiration.
Peter Lockwood is a Postdoctoral researcher on the Project Self-Accomplishment and Local Moralities in Eastern Africa () based at the Graduate Institute, Geneva and an Affiliated Lecturer at the University of Cambridge鈥檚 Department of Social Anthropology.
[1] This included a long period of doctoral fieldwork (January 2017 鈥� July 2018, August 2019) spent living amongst smallholder farmers in Kiambu county experiencing Nairobi鈥檚 urban expansion approach them, and a further month of fieldwork (February 鈥� March 2022) following these transformations two years on.
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