The Aesthetics Trap

Abstract

A Kenya case study. Kenya's Gen-Z cohort is the most digitally native generation in the country's history, and potentially its most economically misaligned.

Summary of the report

The thesis argues that a dominant entrepreneurial ethic anchored on social media virality, platform aesthetics, TikTok commerce and influencer identity carries consequences for productive capacity that the growth statistics have not yet caught up with.

The question it puts to policymakers is whether activity that looks like enterprise is compounding into productive capital, or substituting for it.