Millions of Kenyans live outside Kenya. They are in the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, and throughout Africa. The Kenyan diaspora is substantial and economically significant.
The diaspora was created by colonialism and its aftermath. Colonial education created aspirations for education and advancement that Kenya could not fully satisfy. Economic opportunities that were available in the metropole (the former colonial centers) seemed greater than opportunities at home. Many Kenyans, particularly the educated, migrated.
The Kenyan diaspora sends remittances home. These remittances are economically significant. Families depend on money sent from relatives abroad. Individual remittances may be small but aggregated they are a major source of foreign currency for Kenya.
The diaspora also maintains ties to Kenya. Diaspora members visit, send their children to be educated in Kenya, invest in Kenya. The diaspora is not purely external. It is connected to Kenya.
But the diaspora also represents a loss. The educated people who leave Kenya are lost to Kenya's development. Doctors, engineers, entrepreneurs who could develop Kenya instead develop other countries. The "brain drain" is real.
The diaspora also creates complex relationships with home. Diaspora members often have more resources and more international perspective than people who remained. This can create tensions. Diaspora members may criticize Kenya from afar while never engaging with Kenya's actual conditions. People at home may resent diaspora members who left but maintained claims on Kenya.
The diaspora legacy is of a nation with millions of citizens abroad, of a significant loss of educated people to other countries, of complicated connections between home and abroad. The diaspora reflects Kenya's integration into global systems and Kenya's inability to provide opportunity for all its educated people.
See Also
- Education Paradox
- Urbanisation and Identity
- The Independence Dream and its Limits
- Equity Bank and Financial Inclusion
- The Ethnicity Question