Islamic Entrepreneurship in Senegal: Women's Trajectories in Organizing the Hajj

Since the early 2000s, as the government of Senegal increasingly privatized the organizing of pilgrimages to Mecca, women have massively invested in this sector, once dominated by men. They have become owners and managers of hajj-related travel agencies, taking care of thousands of female and male pilgrims. Based on fieldwork research in Dakar, this article studies how their efforts have evolved in the moral economy of the hajj as actors displaying various forms of agency. We present the strategies of social capital and network mobilization these women have devised and the ways in which they have built on accumulated experiences and knowledge to launch and develop their own agencies. We explore the main challenges they have had to meet: managing the Senegalese state, navigating a complex transnational market, and reconciling business and religious imperatives.