ABSTRACT
This chapter offers a nuanced analysis of the transnational mobility dreams of undocumented African migrants in Guangzhou by examining some of the contradictions in their motility options. On the one hand, undocumented African migrants encountered severe restrictions to their physical and social mobility in China due to state immigration control policy and their vulnerable legal status. On the other hand, African migrants can expand their motility capital, to a certain extent, by making strategic choices in regard to a shifting range of statuses between the 'legal' and 'illegal', and by building personal and business networks within and beyond the African diaspora communities in Guangzhou. The chapter shows that illegal residence started as an involuntary coping strategy for some early African traders as China tightened its immigration control, but it gradually became a voluntary choice for newcomers, especially Nigerian Igbo, as they develop alternative motility options that move beyond the binary between the legal and illegal.
