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A Critical Analysis of the Social and Economic Impact of Asian Diaspora in Kenya

Francis Ogino, University of Nairobi, Kenya
Felix Kiruthu, Kenyatta University, Kenya
Dr. Winston Jumba Akala, Catholic University of Eastern Africa

For centuries Eastern Africa had contact with people from other continents, particularly from Asia. The influx of Asian people into Kenya became more dramatic when British imperialists undertook to open up Kenya’s interior by building the Kenya-Uganda railway between 1895 and 1901. Many Asians of Indian origin, hired as indentured laborers, were brought to Kenya to help with the building of the railway. The railway would open Kenya to a sophisticated web business and of social interaction. Later, at the height of colonialism, the Asians then settled in Kenya and less discriminated by the colonialists established and operated retail and wholesale businesses. Gradually, the Asian Diaspora in Kenya grew to dominate business and industry in post-independent Kenya. Today, Asians of Kenya citizenship own great business empires across the entire East and Central African region, a phenomenon that has gradually elevated Kenya into a regional economic and social hub. This paper therefore seeks to analyze critically the social and economic impact of Asian Diaspora in Kenya. Specifically, the paper utilizes the literature on globalization and ethnic identities to examine how the Asians in Diaspora in Kenya have managed to sustain their identity in Kenya while they remained a major player in a complex regional economy. Further the paper interrogates the post-independence education structures that promoted acceptance of diversity in an originally purely African environment, thereby enhancing opportunity for diasporic Asian communities to flourish in Kenya.