Governing Strangers: African Communities in Guangzhou

With a population of 1.4 billion, the continent of Africa has a similar number of people to China, although it is approximately three times greater in size. Moreover, the continent has fifty-four countries and boasts the most heterogeneous collection of languages in the world. Such diversity is reflected among the Africans travelling to and residing in Guangzhou, a trading port in southern China. In 2018, we surveyed some 120 Africans in Guangzhou, from thirty countries.

 Most were traders buying cheap manufactured goods and shipping them to their home countries. Several trading centres clustered in Yuexiu and Baiyun districts attract a large number of Africans, thanks to the convenient concentration there of factory outlets, affordable hotels and informal housing in their vicinity (see figure 1). The factory outlets selling products from the Pearl River Delta and other provinces, including electronics, clothing and footwear, cosmetics and building materials, are significant hubs for the flow of manufactured goods from China to Africa.

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