This special issue explores a wide range of issues that deal with marketing and culture, giving special attention to those dealing with the convergence of culture and globalization in new and emerging markets.

By documenting my own experiences working with West African microentrepreneurs in markets where the global and the local are now both firmly rooted, I uncover the benefits of an engaged, bottom’s approach to understanding markets and powerfully illustrate how business and humanity are not mutually exclusive.

We propose that successful market development in Africa requires understanding how local resources, such as market structures and socio-cultural bonds outside the market, combine with global tools to provide opportunities for crafting African-relevant strategies for long-term socio-economic sustainability.

We develop a conceptual framework that brings together issues of development, well-being, and social inequalities, highlighting the role of markets in shaping the management of resources, consumer agency, power inequalities and ethics.

We expose the everyday challenges of African microentrepreneurs, establishing why market development efforts must beyond focusing on macro-level barriers to also address the micro-level, tactical difficulties of microentrepreneurship.

We examine the relationship between marketing, development, and human well-being, and explicate the problems in this discourse, outlining three routes to pursue and the benefits of multiple paradigm research.