Short Abstract

This panel analyzes telecommunication companies (telcos) as powerful "extra-digital" actors, shaping African economies, politics, states, and cities. We invite contributions which study telecoms in the context of historical, contemporary, and emergent African capitalism and developmentalism.

Long Abstract

Much scholarship on digital transformation in Africa has focused on the uses and effects of digital infrastructure (e.g. platform work, digital finance, software ecosystems, social media, and data extractivism). Often shaped by narratives of "innovation", this literature has directed attention to successive waves of technologies, from cybercafés to AI. This panel shifts the focus to the material and institutional foundations of African digital capitalism: telecommunications companies (telcos). Over the past three decades, telcos have become among the most influential yet underexamined actors on the continent. Telcos now occupy central positions in African capitalism and developmentalism. They anchor stock markets, expand across borders, invest in critical infrastructure, generate state revenues through spectrum licensing, and shape everyday economic and financial life. Their forms range from locally rooted firms such as Hormuud in Somalia, to regional giants such as MTN, to state-owned monopolies such as Ethio Telecom, and their privatization and regulation have also been key concerns of governments, financiers, and international lenders. As their economic significance has grown, telcos have extended their influence beyond ICT into financial technologies, real estate, energy systems, welfare initiatives, and CSI. Their expansion has been supported by international organizations and development actors (e.g. GSMA, ITU, IFC, DBSA, World Bank) through standard-setting, spectrum policy, data governance, finance, and infrastructure development. We invite papers that centre telcoms, examining them as political and economic actors operating across digital and extra-digital domains. Contributions may take comparative, historical, infrastructural, geopolitical, or political-economy approaches to explore their histories, contemporary dynamics, and ambivalent futures.

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