It appears then that as is the case in other parts of the world, perceptions of AI on the continent are uncertain and are often framed as "techno- utopian or dystopian imaginaries" (Lupton, 2021, p. 1). The former imagi-nary is often ubiquitous, given that it fosters neoliberalism (Jones and Hafner, 2021), which not only emphasises a global order but also "confidently iden-tifies itself with the future" (Brown, 2006, p. 699). Within such a context, the AI economy is characteristically framed as normative – "naturalised as the common-sense way of life […] and a ‘public good’" (Bourne, 2019, p. 113). With its emphasis on economic globalisation, this type of economy is one that typically ignores economic diversity and consequently exac-erbates existing inequalities, subordinating social justice issues such as income gaps, gender inequalities, racial discrimination, and healthcare to the maximisation of profits(cf. George, 2020; Gurumurthy and Chami, 2019). As we have reiterated a number of times, only a few countries in Africa boast the requisite data ecosystems, infrastructure, and resources to tap into the AI economy and improve the socio-economic conditions of their citizens. Yet even in these cases, African digital giants are habitually state-owned, effectively excluding smaller players from entering lucrative markets (cf. Candelon, Bedraoui and Maher, 2021) and in some instances adding to the precarity and vulnerability of gig workers’ lives. In terms of both scenarios, the existence of monopolies in the telecommunications industry offers a case in point. With respect to the former, "New entrants into some telecoms markets in Africa often complain of anticompetitive or unfair monopolistic behaviours adopted by dominant incumbent play-ers" (Amadasun et al., 2021, p. 5). With respect to the latter, M-Pesa, for example, is a mobile money service provider in Kenya structured around thousands of agents that locals significantly refer to as "human ATMS" (McBride and Liyala, 2021, p. 3). This appellation underscores the reality that although M-Pesa has increased employment opportunities, supposedly allowing for leapfrogging over old technologies and affording financial inclusion, its informal workers’ knowledge and behaviours are essentially traded for profit. Park (2020) contends that "narratives of technologi-cal leapfrogging and ‘financial inclusion’ elide the reliance of the digital economy on older formations of precarious, often feminized, reserves of labour power […] whose progenitors can be easily discarded in the inter-est of profitability" (p. 917). Tinashe Chimedza, associate director at the Institute of Public Affairs in Zimbabwe (IPAZIM), identifies ECOCASH in this country and SAFARICOM in Tanzania as other local digital plat-forms that are worsening unjust gender relations in Africa: "when the bot-tom lines from the gig economy are announced from MPESA in Kenya, ECOCASH in Zimbabwe and SAFARICOM in Tanzania, the question that faces us is: Where are the women when the dividend cheques are written?" (Chimedza, 2018, p. 100).
It is certainly the case that African countries are seeking to exploit emerg-ing technologies, striving to move beyond colonial and post-colonial abuses. Indeed, digital entrepreneurship on the continent is flourishing as a direct result of the fourth industrial revolution, and success cases abound. In this respect, and using a multi-site case study approach, Friederici, Wahome and Graham (2020) offer numerous examples of the boom currently tak-ing place, to a greater or lesser extent, in 11 cities across Anglophone, Francophone, and Lusophone Africa. These cities are Abidjan, Accra, Addis Ababa, Dakar, Johannesburg/Pretoria, Kampala, Kigali, Lagos, Maputo, Nairobi, and Yaoundé. However, Friederici et al. (2020) also note that entrepreneurial ventures across the continent do not necessarily translate into breaking free from Africa’s socio-economic legacies. This is in part because much of the digital infrastructure is in the hands of non-African companies (Hruby, 2018). While facilitating entrepreneurship on the conti-nent, transnational digital platforms such as those in North America have nevertheless "strategically monopolized precisely the most scalable digital product categories, outcompeting upstarts from other locations based on financial advantages, multipronged scaling economies, and lock-in effects" (Friederici, Wahome and Graham, 2020, p. 218). Currently, American digi-tal companies such as Amazon, Apple (Alphabet), Facebook, and Google dominate the continent, and it appears that Asian companies that include Alibaba, Baidu, Huawei, and Tencent are not far behind (Hruby, 2018). In fact, in marked contrast to European companies, US- and Asian-based com-panies enjoy the monopoly over data reserves across the globe, making it impossible for African countries to join the AI race at this stage.Technological ecosystems managed by monopolies and tethered to neoliberal economies embedded in already precarious social, economic, and political landscapes simply cannot and do not reflect inclusivity, participation, and plurality. In the context of the fourth industrial revolution, scenarios such as these make the continent highly susceptible, among other things, to what Benyera (2021, p. 15) refers to as "the (re)colonisation of Africa and Africans" (Benyera, 2021, p. 15).
In an earlier chapter, mention was made of China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), an enterprise ostensibly established to facilitate infrastructure projects in Africa and Europe. Given a number of significant deficits in Africa related to infrastructure and funding, the BRI appears to be a logical and attractive solution to many countries’ strategic development goals. Among a host of benefits to Africa, the BRI "could contribute in meeting the continent’s huge infrastructure financing requirement, estimated at US$130–170 billion per year" (African Development Bank [AfDB], 2018;Lisinge, 2020, p. 426).
To date, 42 African countries have agreements with the BRI (Shukra, Zhou and Wang, 2021), and specific developments such as Nigeria’s 2,600-megawatt Mambilla Hydropower Station; railroad construction in Gabon, Mauritania, and Nigeria (Risberg, 2019, p. 45); and the Standard Gauge Railway initiative in Kenya (Wilson-Andoh, 2022) appear to showcase the advantages of these agreements. Although most BRI projects are aimed at energy and transportation, some focus on the ICT sector. At the opening ceremony of The Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation five years ago, President Xi of China called for BRI initiatives that also facili-tate innovation in the sense that they "pursue innovation-driven develop-ment and intensify cooperation in frontier areas such as digital economy, artificial intelligence, nanotechnology and quantum computing" (Xi, 2017, p. 5). In 2015, China launched the digital development component of the BRI, which it expedited once COVID-19 broke out. Among other things, this component involved the use of Chinese AI-enabled technology to power diagnostic systems and ensure that medical provisions were tracked (Lo, 2021).
While clearly beneficial to society, such digital pursuits in Africa have a shadow side. In this regard, one of the more treacherous forms of techno-logical dystopia that we have touched on constitutes AI-enabled technolo-gies that are slowly yet steadily being co-opted by digital dictatorships, which describe governments tracking, controlling, and undermining their citizens’ freedoms (Gopaldas, 2019, p. 4). In a policy brief on digital author-itarianism, Polyakova and Meserole (2019) note that technology manufac-tured by China’s ZTE (Zhongxing Telecommunications Equipment) is deployed in Ethiopia to surveil both journalists and the opposition, while in southern African countries such as Angola and Zimbabwe, Chinese technol-ogy such as that produced by CloudWalk is employed to monitor political opponents on a mass scale. According to a global survey of social media manipulation conducted in 2020, at least 81 countries make use of a specific type of trolling activity in the form of so-called cyber troops, 13 of which are African countries (Bradshaw, Bailey and Howard, 2021, pp. 1–2). Cyber troops, defined as "government or political party actors tasked with manip-ulating public opinion online" (Bradshaw et al., 2021, p. 1), work through social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter (see also Vilmer et al. 2018, p. 98).
To return to Chinese investment in Africa, beyond concerns about the BRI’s digital component potentially being exploited by authoritarian regimes are those related to BRI projects in general: there are increasing instances of African countries postponing or even cancelling BRI projects over rising debt concerns (Lokanathan, 2020). In a recent working paper commissioned by the Center for Global Development, Landry and Portelance (2021) report that countries such as Angola, Djibouti, and Kenya are heavily indebted to China and that "African countries make up half of the 50 countries most indebted to China as a percentage of GDP" (Landry and Portelance, 2021, p. 3). In addition, Risberg (2019) refers to the "debt trap diplomacy" narra-tive according to which "China provides infrastructure funding to develop-ing economies under opaque loan terms, only to strategically leverage the recipient country’s indebtedness to China for economic, military, or political favor" (p. 43). The narrative suggests that China seizes assets in cases where countries renege on their debt agreements. Research around BRI debt and seizure of assets is, however, mixed. In a special report on the economic impact of BRI on Africa, and specifically on Ethiopia, Kenya, and Nigeria, Adeniran et al. (2021) recount that the benefits appear to be greater than the costs, with potential growth in areas such as trade and commodities. However, they also caution that Chinese BRI investment is resulting in uneven benefits across Africa, with "[t]op commodity producers and export-ers" (Adeniran et al., 2021, p. 2) reaping most of the rewards. As for debt traps, Jones and Hameiri (2020) report that the narrative around seizure of assets is a false one, based on accounts that Sri Lanka and Malaysia were victims of China’s predatory system in 2017 and 2018, respectively. These researchers point out that "Their debt distress has not arisen predominantly from the granting of predatory Chinese loans, but rather from the miscon-duct of local elites and Western-dominated financial markets" (Jones and Hameiri, 2020, p. 2).
Whatever public and private views of BRI investments in Africa encom-pass, the fact remains that the continent’s debt burdens hamper the design and development of ICT platforms that are able to accommodate AI tech-nologies. This is in addition to the reality that many countries lack adequate physical infrastructure related to transport, communication, and power to drive AI ecosystems. With regard to the latter, several African nations pay far more for energy than other nations, despite the fact that they might in fact consume very little of it: this reality hits home when one considers that "in Mali, for example, the average person uses less electricity in a year over-all than a Londoner uses just to power their tea kettle" (Lakmeeharan et al., 2020, p. 2). With respect to social infrastructure, African nations also face challenges with regard to access to quality water, sanitation, healthcare, and education (cf. Auriacombe and Van der Walt, 2021). Presently, a handful of countries such as Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, and South Africa are employing AI-enabled technologies in sectors that include healthcare, agriculture, and finance (Gadzala, 2018), while most African markets have been left out of the AI loop. Infrastructural deficits, coupled to uneven socio-economic development and growth across and within nations, are why we call for a focus on AI that acknowledges that this technology is not the panacea to Africa’s challenges – that it needs to be consistently viewed through a socio-technical lens that recognises colonial, post-colonial, and contemporary realities.