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wa-Mungai, Mbugua

doi:10.2307/j.ctvk3gmfc.16

Cited by 4 publications

(7 citation statements)

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“…It is difficult to know precisely how many people depend on the matatu sector for subsistence at any given time; figures range from 87,000 to 160,000 individuals employed (wa Mungai 2013). In addition to the drivers and conductors, the wider matatu economic system and social life includes the touts 8 and route managers, but also women selling warm mandazi , as well as young musicians selling their newest songs and music collaborations to crew members to play in their vehicles 9 .…”

Section: Moving Targetsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Unlike Mungiki , Kamjesh is much more localized and ambiguous. They are not as well documented as Mungiki , although they have been referenced by scholars of Nairobi's informal settlements (van Stapele 2007) and of matatu workers (wa Mungai 2013). People understand Kamjesh to be anything from ‘a vigilante gang like Mungiki ’ to ‘just a group of friends in the neighbourhood’.…”

Section: Dangerous Negotiations In the Hustle Economymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Matatu workers are also common scapegoats for Kenyan citizens’ bad commuting behaviour (Mutongi 2006) and an outlet for these commuters’ dissatisfaction with life in the city (wa Mungai and Samper 2006). Like other informal transportation systems in Africa, in the final years of colonial rule, ‘pirate taxis’, which would become matatu , emerged as a home-grown solution to neglectful service based on exclusionary colonial planning, which had ignored the needs of African residents for decades (Heinze 2018; Aduwo 1990; wa Mungai 2013). As the number of these early matatu grew throughout the early 1960s, the drivers, who were often the owners, were only able to continually violate the colonial monopoly on passenger transport by conspiring with the police, who would often accept payments in exchange for looking the other way when the ‘pirate taxis’ blatantly picked up passengers waiting at bus stops 7 .…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“… 3 See wa Mungai (2013), Mutongi (2017), Klopp and Mitullah (2015), Salon and Gulyani (2010) and Lamont (2013), as well as features in The New York Times and The Guardian and on the BBC.…”

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confidence: 99%

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‘You will build me’: fiscal disobedience, reciprocity and the dangerous negotiations of redistribution on Nairobi'smatatu

Ference¹

2021

Africa

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Those who populate the productive frontiers of capitalism are often targets of violence by groups and institutions aiming to poach, control and regulate their economic practices. This article draws on years of ethnographic research conducted with informal transport operators in Nairobi who drive, conduct and own the minibus taxis called matatu. In order to navigate the city, this workforce engages in a coordinated but tense economic dance along the dangerous and shifting lines between illegality, work and reciprocity. The article aims to situate the more dangerous and morally ambiguous aspects of the ‘hustle economy’ ethnographically, within the generative and ultimately mobile location of urban transportation infrastructures of the matatu sector. Building on the conceptualizations of social infrastructure of AbdouMaliq Simone and Janet Roitman's study of fiscal disobedience, whereby the legitimacy of regulatory authority is questioned and undermined, matatu workers as infrastructure challenge multiple levels of state and non-state regulation through a variety of practices that blend danger, violence and control with solidarity, reciprocity and redistribution. This article evaluates and analyses distinctive features of ‘hustling’ in Nairobi through the ethnographic lens of matatu transportation operators as they navigate dangerous negotiations with the state, the police and vigilante gangs.

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Section: Moving Targetsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Dangerous Negotiations In the Hustle Economymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“… 3 See wa Mungai (2013), Mutongi (2017), Klopp and Mitullah (2015), Salon and Gulyani (2010) and Lamont (2013), as well as features in The New York Times and The Guardian and on the BBC.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

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‘You will build me’: fiscal disobedience, reciprocity and the dangerous negotiations of redistribution on Nairobi'smatatu

Ference¹

2021

Africa

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“…Transport systems have been a vital constituent of African cities and their connections to broad rural areas (Beck et al, 2017). Scholars have addressed various political-economic and socio-cultural conditions of roads (Klaeger, 2012), motor-vehicles (Hart, 2016; Mutongi, 2017; Wa Mungai, 2013) and bus stations (Stasik and Cissokho, 2018) in transport systems. Among them, bus stations in African cities epitomise constellations of social and spatial relationships among various actors within urban rhythms.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Cohabiting commerce in a transport hub: Peoples as infrastructure in Lagos, Nigeria

Xiao

Adebayo

2019

Urban Studies

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Based on a case study of Iyana Ipaja, one of the largest transport hubs with a spacious motor park and the most vibrant markets in North Lagos, we elaborate on the nuances of interactions between commercial actors and various forms of infrastructure in the spatial and temporal senses. In terms of materiality and mobility of their businesses, commercial actors are categorised into three types, shopkeepers, stallholders and hawkers. They have extensive interactions with the objects with which they are attached (shops, stalls and goods), the physical infrastructures (vehicles, roads, bus stations and motor parks), and ‘people as infrastructure’ – a term coined by Simone – including drivers, passengers, passers-by and government agencies. We suggest that a modification to the concept of ‘peoples as infrastructure’ should help to articulate interactions among differently positioned actors. We argue that the localities and mobilities of commercial practices manifest spatial conviviality among peoples as infrastructure. The temporality of their commercial practices is embedded in the urban rhythm of Lagos and remediates the flows of people and vehicles through the spaces of Iyana Ipaja. The focus of commercial actors provides a new perspective to rethink grassroots spatial politics of motor parks in Nigeria. Moreover, this case study critically engages the theory of relationality of ‘people as infrastructure’ in urban Africa.

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Inside the System, Outside the Law: Operating the Matatu Sector in Nairobi

Rasmussen

2012

Urban Forum

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Cited by 4 publications

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‘You will build me’: fiscal disobedience, reciprocity and the dangerous negotiations of redistribution on Nairobi'smatatu

‘You will build me’: fiscal disobedience, reciprocity and the dangerous negotiations of redistribution on Nairobi'smatatu

Cohabiting commerce in a transport hub: Peoples as infrastructure in Lagos, Nigeria

Inside the System, Outside the Law: Operating the Matatu Sector in Nairobi

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