Killings of persons with albinism (PWAs) in Tanzania: Deconstructing dominant cause narratives (2007-2015)

This study seeks to identify dominant narratives around the causes of killings of people with albinism (PWAs) in Tanzania. The main causal narratives found were around witchcraft and cultural prejudices as causes. These included the more academic ‘Occult Economy’ approach, not to be confused with ‘religious economy’, explored later in the study. A second set of dominant narratives, associated with government and NGOs, sees failures to implement the law as the main problem. Finally a third set of narratives centres on economic factors, especially poverty, as the main cause behind the killings. These are associated mainly with academic studies. Besides media, government, NGO and academic narratives, the study sought an alternative narrative to explain the phenomenon of killings of PWAs in Tanzania in a more multi-causal way. This was found to be what is called the religious economy approach, associated with the demand and supply narrative of religious goods. This theory is reviewed at the end of this study. Overall the study aims to unpack some dominant and less dominant public (media and NGO) and academic narratives. In this way, we go beyond the common understanding that witchcraft and poverty alone are responsible for killings of PWAs in Tanzania. The study finds that demand and supply for supernatural support, even among the educated and wealthy, implies that killings of PWAs have become what Durkheim calls part of social reality. The study concludes that the problem of killings of PWAs requires addressing the uncertainties of people through modern day scientific solution to their problem in order to demystify decades of supernatural beliefs as well as partnerships between those with different causal narratives, in government, media, civil society including religious organisations, academia and PWAs themselves.