Original Date: April 2, 2024
Female traders, artisans, tailors, and peasants are found at the margins of the national economies. To survive and flourish, they have evolved a business model which I refer to as the Utu-Ubuntu business economic model. The model is hinged on logic, norms, and values of self-reliance, resilience, pooling, sharing, solidarity, and reciprocity.
The dialogue with Kimyanjui engages with the sub-themes hinted at above, It will begin with a theoretical perspective of centering fireside knowledge and Utu feminism; followed by a discussion on the Utu-Ubuntu business economic model and a description of the way the business model is organized. Finally, Kinyanjui will discuss how the business surplus is deployed.
About Mary Njeri Kinyanjui
Mary Njeri Kinyanjui is an independent scholar who has published on women’s movements, the informal economy in Africa, ubuntu business models, and how women experience anthropain in their everyday lives. She taught at the University of Nairobi’s Institute for Development Studies for many years. She earned her doctoral degree in geography from the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom.