Papers by Joram Tarusarira
Religion and Human Security in Africa, 2019
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Policy and Practice; a Development Education Review, 2017
A positive response to migration requires a joint effort from both the migrants and citizens of t... more A positive response to migration requires a joint effort from both the migrants and citizens of the host countries. Migration, especially forced migration, engenders negative personal and socio-psychological impacts on refugees, asylum seekers and economic migrants. The traumatic experiences they encounter on the journey from their homelands to host countries cause helplessness, fear and dependency. On the other hand, citizens of the host countries often have a negative psychological disposition toward migrants. This has been more distinct with the increased flow of migrants and refugees into Europe following conflict, civil wars and economic inertia in Africa and the Middle East. For effective and positive migration governance, citizens of host countries need to transform their negative socio-psychological attitudes and dispositions towards migrants, and the migrants need to restore their confidence as well as increase trust with the host countries to facilitate social cohesion. Th...
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
This chapter argues that people act on the basis of how they conceive of a situation. It also arg... more This chapter argues that people act on the basis of how they conceive of a situation. It also argues that alongside reconciliation and healing must be a democratization process because the two safeguard the existence of the other. In transitional power-sharing governments, as was the case in Zimbabwe from 2009 to 2013, the former power holder remains in government, as did the Zimbabwe African National Union Patriotic Front government. In 1985 a Zimbabwe commission of inquiry known as the Chihambakwe Commission was set up to investigate governmental repression of “dissidents” in Matabeleland and Midlands Provinces. In Zimbabwe the dominant view of reconciliation has been based on forgiveness and until this conception is reformed or reconstituted, reconciliation and healing will remain shallow and elusive. In Zimbabwe reconciliation should be seen as a process aimed at restoring social and political trust through attitudinal and institutional reform. The social dimension addresses bro...
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
The Ecumenical Review
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Peace and Conflict Studies, 2017
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Religions, 2022
This article used the case of the Pokot community in northern Kenya to argue that focusing only o... more This article used the case of the Pokot community in northern Kenya to argue that focusing only on technical approaches in dealing with conflicts induced by climate change neglects the deeper religio-spiritual mechanisms that motivate actors in such conflicts and give the latter their texture. For example, the sacred connection with cattle, forests, and land, or the spiritual blessings of cattle raiders in times of competition over dwindling resources raise questions concerning whether and how indigenous religions’ sacred beliefs and practices contribute to finding peaceful solutions to such conflicts and advancing the discourse of religious peacebuilding. This article deployed the concept of religious environmental sense-making to argue that framing climate-induced conflicts in sacred terms influences how actors position themselves within them, as well as their level of intensity and intractability. Answering this question is crucial to advancing the field of peacebuilding, underst...
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
A distinct phenomenon of religio-political actors that emerged in Zimbabwe as a result of the soc... more A distinct phenomenon of religio-political actors that emerged in Zimbabwe as a result of the socio-economic and political crises since 2000, alleged co-option and acquiescence of the mainline churches and the influence of globalisation, has received no more than fleeting attention in the academic discourse of religion in Zimbabwe’s political domain. Much of the available literature and research on religion and politics in Zimbabwe concentrates on the mainline church bodies and denominational histories, such as the Roman Catholic Church, Zimbabwe Council of Churches, or Zimbabwe Assemblies of God Africa. Non-doctrinal religio-political individuals and groups have been treated either as a marginal phenomenon or lumped together with confessional or 'conversionist' churches under the rubric of religious actors. This consequently obscures the uniqueness of emergent religio-political organizations that have assumed a civil society character in pursuit of broader political objecti...
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
This article argues that despite presiding over a failed economy, the Zimbabwe African Union Patr... more This article argues that despite presiding over a failed economy, the Zimbabwe African Union Patriotic Front (ZANU PF) led by Robert Mugabe, has willing and enthusiastic supporters. There are claims that the large crowds witnessed singing and dancing at ZANU PF rallies are mobilized by force because the attendees do not benefit anything from supporting the regime. In a divergence from the consensus of the literature, this article surfaces other explanations than coercion for the huge turnout at rallies, rented crowds, handouts, and well-articulated election manifestos. The psychological dimension, especially the fundamentalist mindset created by instrumentalist nationalism, is one such other perspective to clarifying why this is the case. It might also explain why some Zimbabweans are so susceptible to compliance with power relations that subordinate them. Thus, a psychological dimension is added to the level of analysis beyond the often resorted to socio-economic and political expl...
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Journal for the Study of Religion
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Zeitschrift für Religion, Gesellschaft und Politik
This article analyses a conflict that erupted in 2021 between the government of Zimbabwe and the ... more This article analyses a conflict that erupted in 2021 between the government of Zimbabwe and the people of Chilonga in the south of the country over the expropriation of their ancestral for the production of lucerne grass. The people of Chilonga resisted being displaced from land to which they are deeply attached and have a sacred connection. This conflict provides a rare opportunity to analyze the often marginalized, muted and misunderstood sacred roots of the environmental conflict that shape collective agency. The article uses the concepts of emplacement and disemplacement to comprehend the deeper and more intangible impacts of displacing people from their grazing lands, sources of water and traditional herbs and medicines, and sacred sites—natural resources they claim to be sacred. Thus, while disemplacement has been used to explain why people find themselves moving, the article uses it to show the opposite: why they resist moving and demonstrate the not easily measured losses u...
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Themes in Religion and Human Security in Africa
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
The Review of Faith & International Affairs
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
In the post-colonial history of presidential aspirants in Zimbabwe, no politician has been as ove... more In the post-colonial history of presidential aspirants in Zimbabwe, no politician has been as overtly religious as Nelson Chamisa, the current leader of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). Chamisa identifies himself as a politician and a pastor whose politics are guided by his Christian faith. However, he took religious rhetoric to mobilise support to an unprecedented level when he explicitly blurred the boundaries between functions by calling for and leading a week of fasting and prayer from 29th July to 4th August 2019. Through a digital ethnography of Chamisa's Twitter posts and the direct responses to them posted by members of the public during the fasting and prayer week, this article investigates how this call was received by those who responded on Twitter and what this tells us about Zimbabweans' perceptions of religious politics, that is, the deployment of dominant religions like Christianity in politics.
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Religions
In post-independence Zimbabwe, religion has been associated with piety and acquiescence rather th... more In post-independence Zimbabwe, religion has been associated with piety and acquiescence rather than radical confrontation. This has made it look preposterous for religious leaders to adopt seemingly radical and confrontational stances in pursuit of peace and reconciliation. Since the early 2000s, a new breed of religious leaders that deploy radical and confrontational strategies to pursue peace has emerged in Zimbabwe. Rather than restricting pathways to peace and reconciliation to nonconfrontational approaches such as empathy, pacifism, prayer, meditation, love, repentance, compassion, apology and forgiveness, these religious leaders have extended them to demonstrations, petitions and critically speaking out. Because these religious leaders do not restrict themselves to the methods and strategies of engagement and dialogue advocated by mainstream church leaders, mainstream church leaders and politicians condemn them as nonconformists that transcend their religious mandate. These re...
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
The Review of Faith & International Affairs
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Themes in Religion and Human Security in Africa
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Religions
In post-independence Zimbabwe, religion has been associated with piety and acquiescence rather th... more In post-independence Zimbabwe, religion has been associated with piety and acquiescence rather than radical confrontation. This has made it look preposterous for religious leaders to adopt seemingly radical and confrontational stances in pursuit of peace and reconciliation. Since the early 2000s, a new breed of religious leaders that deploy radical and confrontational strategies to pursue peace has emerged in Zimbabwe. Rather than restricting pathways to peace and reconciliation to nonconfrontational approaches such as empathy, pacifism, prayer, meditation, love, repentance, compassion, apology and forgiveness, these religious leaders have extended them to demonstrations, petitions and critically speaking out. Because these religious leaders do not restrict themselves to the methods and strategies of engagement and dialogue advocated by mainstream church leaders, mainstream church leaders and politicians condemn them as nonconformists that transcend their religious mandate. These re...
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Reconciliation and Religio-political Non-conformism in Zimbabwe
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Bookmarks Related papers MentionsView impact
Uploads
Papers by Joram Tarusarira