Doctoral Dissertation Research: Refashioning Transnational Spaces; The Case of Textiles and Apparel in Kenya

University Of North Carolina At Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill NC

Investigators

Abstract

Tina Mangieri University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill Refashioning Transnational Spaces: The Case of Textiles and Apparel in Kenya Textiles and clothing were important industries in Africa's post-colonial economic development. Import substitution policies enabled countries to develop a manufacturing sector of cloth and clothing production for local consumption, and proved attractive for quota seeking foreign manufacturers in the 1980s (especially Taiwanese producers). Trade liberalization rules are now transforming the conditions under which these industries were built. Foreign contracting and direct investment decisions are increasingly shaped by the exigencies of export-oriented apparel production. Quota removal and tariff reduction have increased competitive pressures and the difficulties facing African producers. Contract production for international markets is, however, only one part of the wider tapestry of African cloth production. This research project will examine the structure of and interrelationships among the three main systems of international clothing production in Kenya: (i) "African" print cloth with its own transnational histories of design, production, and trade; (ii) export-oriented mass produced clothing primarily for large Western markets; and (iii) imported secondhand clothing sourced from those same markets. These three clothing systems and their interrelated production networks illustrate new geographies of global economic and cultural integration. By focusing on these three networks, the investigator will examine their interconnections and analyze case histories of specific companies, clothing import policies, and the material landscapes they have produced (such as Export Processing Zones and wholesale/retail used apparel markets). Interviews and focus groups at each stage of the research will provide empirical contributions on the interactions of gender, class, and religion with global textile and apparel commodity chains. This material will be used to expand the possibilities and potential offered by global commodity chain analyses which remain overwhelmingly silent on issues of identity and their articulation with global chains, including those for textiles and apparel. This project will provide new insights into increasingly complex global economic geographies by focusing on historical and contemporary networks of trade and production between countries of the global South. Issues of South-South trade and the role of domestic markets are greatly under-represented in the contemporary literature on global apparel. Yet, understanding the broader contexts within which clothing production and consumption relations and networks are produced and sustained is vital to avoid naturalizing notions like 'competitiveness' and 'growth.' Similarly, attention to these contexts is needed to provide conceptual alternatives to normative understandings of globalization as fundamentally limited to Western practices and experiences. By exploring the links between economies and cultural communities of the South, the project will both advance basic knowledge and offer policy insights to African and other countries whose development strategies are turning increasingly toward regional cooperation.