‘Going out’ and ‘going on’: Teleology, polyphony and temporal encounters of a Chinese plantation in Tanzania

While China’s overseas engagements are frequently scrutinised as spatial enclaves, their temporal constitution remains largely unexamined. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork at a Chinese state-owned sisal plantation in Tanzania, this article identifies a fundamental disjuncture: what I term ‘teleological going out’, the state’s mandate as a teleological projection towards distant futures, collides with ‘polyphonic going on’, the everyday unfolding of divergent lived temporalities. Through dual perspectives examining state temporal governmentality from above and lived experiences from below, the article reveals how this tension permeates the enclave both internally, where state timelines collide with lived temporalities, and externally, at its interface with local communities, generating moments of friction and alignment. Rather than a static container, the enclave emerges as a dynamic site where ‘polyphonic going on’ continuously renegotiates ‘teleological going out’.