Kevin Donovan

Kevin Donovan is a Senior Lecturer in African & Development Studies at the Centre of African Studies, University of Edinburgh. His research intersects anthropology, history, political economy, and science & technology studies, focusing on East Africa. Key areas include the politics of knowledge in development aid, digital infrastructures, biometric identification, and mobile financial services.

His 2024 book Money, Value, and the State: Sovereignty & Citizenship in East Africa (Cambridge University Press) examines economic self-determination during and after decolonization. Current projects include a book with Emma Park on Parastatal: Intimacy and Rent in Digital Kenya, analyzing Safaricom's cultural politics. He also co-edited Capitalizing Africa: High Finance from Below, an ethnographic study of financial practices in multiple African countries.

Donovan's work explores digital economies, surveillance, and telecommunications regulation across the Global South. He co-convened a 2020 series on data politics in eastern Africa and consults for international organizations on digital data and AI. His research has appeared in Cultural Anthropology and other venues, though no additional articles are explicitly listed in the provided texts.