CRG Seminar: Global dreams, local realities - Fashion design and digital technology in Accra

This study examines how digital technologies shape the global aspirations of Ghanaian fashion designers. Drawing on interviews with 17 designers in Accra, Adwoa Owusuaa Bobie situates their practices within broader debates on digital entrepreneurship in Africa. Popular and scholarly narratives often frame African digital entrepreneurs through techno-optimistic imaginaries, portraying them as visionary agents of economic leapfrogging. While such promises rarely materialize in the anticipated form, entrepreneurs are nonetheless creatively and productively adapting digital tools to transcend local economic, social, and political contexts. Bobie explores how Accra-based designers mobilize digital platforms, media, and networks in contextually embedded ways to pursue international success. She show that these engagements both enable and constrain their capacity to “go global,” revealing the complex interplay between aspiration for globalization, technological adaptation, and structural limitations in African creative industries.

This seminar is organised by the Collaborative Research Group Governance, entrepreneurship and inclusive development.