Building sustainable reconciliation in South African communities experiencing witch burnings

Since 1994, lethal violence toward people suspected of witchcraft has escalated in rural communities in South Africa. Hundreds of older people believed to be witches have been burned to death and thousands who have escaped death have taken refuge in government established camps. The purpose of this literature review and qualitative study was to examine a group counseling approach that promotes “sustainable reconciliation” with traumatized individuals in communities divided by violence due to witchcraft persecution. Specifically, the author examined a single case sample of a group counseling session aimed at reconciliation. Fifteen group members included individuals from conflictual parties from geographic areas in South Africa where there are witch burnings. Beyond the 15 group members, 11 other participants rated the group session and its potential for fostering sustainable reconciliation. These 11 individuals were divided into 2 groups: (a) American student raters (N = 3) and (b) South African observers ( N = 8). This study was constructed as a 10 step process of data gathering and a “constant comparison” (Strauss & Corbin, 1994) of data categorized by all participants. As defined by Glaser and Strauss (1967), the Grounded Theory methodology allowed for an emergence of common themes across raters that could be related to theories for sustainable reconciliation, trauma counseling, group process, and witchcraft persecution. The results of this study suggest that sustainable peace is possible using the “reconciliation group counseling” approach. With these specific types of groups, special consideration must be given to leadership style, building safety, and including the entire community that has been effected by witch persecution. However, according to participants, reconciliation groups will fail if the fundamental reasons for the violence continue to go unattended (e.g., poverty, unemployment). Such fundamental issues perpetuate feelings of fear and hopelessness in community members which fosters an unstable environment. These results suggest that therapists must understand the context of such violence, attend to the trauma symptoms of individuals, and perhaps play a supportive role in the group. The South African observers suggested that successive counseling groups, with public admittance of behavior and retribution for losses would be necessary before sustainable peace could be possible.