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IBS Lunchtime Research Seminar - The Strategic Cultivation of ‘Localness’: Banks in Rwanda, 1962-2016

Henley Live Tree
Event information
Date 9 October 2024
Time 13:00-14:30 (Timezone: Europe/London)
Price Free
Venue Henley Business School, Whiteknights Campus
Event types:
Seminars

You are cordially invited to attend an International Business and Strategy Departmental Research Meeting, during which there will be a presentation by Dr Thomas De Berge - Loyola University Chicago. A reminder that attendance for IBS (full time, research oriented) staff and full-time students is compulsory, and where possible, must be in person. Individuals unable to attend in person, due to legitimate reasons will be provided a Teams link on request. Non-IBS staff are welcome to attend, but must register prior to the event. If you have not received the email invite please email Angie Clark

Please join us in Room 108, Henley Business School, if you would like to attend, please register using the link below:

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Please make sure you let me know in advance if you intend to attend in person so that the correct amount of catering is booked.

Date: Wednesday 9th October 2024, HBS Room 108

Time: 13.00 - 14.15pm

Abstract:

This article explores how banks strategically managed local identities in a context in which the ideas of 'foreign' and 'local' came to be embedded in historical geography, informed by the distinct urban and rural development pathways specific to colonial and post-colonial Rwanda. The article charts a long span of history, from the periods of Belgian colonial rule to independence to post-genocide reconstruction, through which the political and economic trajectories of Rwandan development came to structure the meanings of 'foreign' and 'local' around the urban-rural divide. The article then focuses in on the recent entry of African multinational banks into Rwanda as the driver for domestic Rwandan banks to strategically cultivate an identity of 'localness' that is dependent on historically-derived, context-specific meanings. In this way, the meanings of 'foreign' and 'local' are explored as malleable concepts that firms can manage

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