Peer-reviewed article
"Child marriage" in context: exploring local attitudes towards early marriage in rural Tanzania.
Susan B Schaffnit, Mark Urassa, David W Lawson ·
Summary
Written by AI, not yet AICS's view · claude-haiku-4-5-20251001This study explores local attitudes towards early marriage in rural Tanzania through focus group discussions and a survey of 993 women. The research finds that contrary to global anti-child-marriage campaigns, young women in this context are often active participants in choosing when and whom to marry, rather than passive victims. Marriage is viewed locally as a means to acquire social status within the community. The study suggests that understanding these local perspectives is important for designing effective policies to address early marriage.
Key points
- Women in rural Tanzania frequently take active rather than passive roles in selecting when and who to marry
- Early marriage is normative in northwestern Tanzania, with marriage before or shortly after 18 years being common
- Marriage is widely viewed as instrumental in acquiring social status within the local community
- Global anti-child-marriage campaigns often rely on assumptions about girls' lack of autonomy that may not reflect local realities
- Understanding local motivations and attitudes is important for developing effective policies to address early marriage
Limitations
This is an exploratory qualitative study focused on attitudes and motivations rather than outcomes; it does not measure the actual wellbeing impacts of early marriage or longitudinal effects on the young women who marry early. The study also cannot determine whether expressed agency in marriage selection reflects genuine decision-making power or socially desirable responses.
Abstract
A global campaign to end "child marriage" has emerged over the last decade as part of growing international commitments to address gender inequities and improve female wellbeing. Campaigns typically assert that young brides have negligible autonomy in the marriage process and that marrying under 18 years has resolutely negative impacts on wellbeing. Yet, surprisingly few studies explore local attitudes towards marriage and its timing within contexts where early marriage is most common. As such our understanding of motivations and potential conflicts of interest leading female adolescents into marriage remain poorly informed by viewpoints of people purportedly at risk. We present an exploratory study of attitudes to early marriage in northwestern Tanzania where marriage before or shortly after 18 years is normative. We use focus group discussions, complimented by a survey of 993 women, to investigate local views on marriage. We explore (i) why people marry, (ii) when marriage is deemed appropriate, and (iii) who guides the marriage process. Contrary to dominant narratives in the end child marriage movement, we find that women are frequently active rather than passive in the selection of when and who to marry. Furthermore, marriage is widely viewed as instrumental in acquiring social status within one's local community. Our conclusions illuminate why rates of early marriage remain high despite potential negative wellbeing consequences and increasingly restrictive laws. We discuss our results in relation to related qualitative studies in other cultural contexts and consider the policy implications for current efforts to limit early marriage in Tanzania and beyond.