Hilda Tizeba
Thesis title: Autonomy, Paternalism and the Regulation of Mental Healthcare in Low-Resource Settings: Examining the Case of Tanzania
PhD supervisors:
Background
Hilda has been a PhD candidate at the Centre for Health, Medical Law and Ethics at the Edinburgh Law School since 2022. Hilda has over five years of teaching experience working as a lecturer at the University of Dar es Salaam, School of Law. She also engages in mental health advocacy through the non-profit Guided Path which raises mental health awareness and need for policy and legal reform in the mental health sector.
Qualifications
LL.M in Criminal Justice, University of Western Cape and Humboldt University
LL.B (Honours) University of Dar es Salaam
Responsibilities & affiliations
Member of the Mason Institute at the University of Edinburgh School of Law
Member of the Global Alliance for Behavioural Health and Social Justice - USA
Member of the United Nations International Law Seminar Alumni Network - Switzerland
Programme Assistant for the Students as Change Agents Project - University of Edinburgh, Career Service
Attorney and Advocate of the High Court of Tanzania
CEO and Founder of Guided Path- Tanzania
Member of the Tanganyika Law Society - Tanzania
Undergraduate teaching
Tutor in Criminal Law, University of Edinburgh School of Law
Postgraduate teaching
Online support tutor on Information, Control and Power
Research summary
Hilda's research interests lie in the intersection between human rights, mental disability and international law. She approaches these subjects from a decolonial and feminist perspective. Her research seeks to respond to questions such as how should we conceptualise autonomy in mental healthcare in the context of the Global South? To what extent should a human rights based approach such as the one advocated by the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) be utilised in the design and regulation of mental healthcare systems in countries such as Tanzania? To answer these questions, she employs an interdisciplinary methodological approach, whereby, alongside law and ethics, she draws on insights from a range of literatures, including international law, psychiatry, and sociology, where necessary. Further, she utilises a socio-legal approach, predicated on the understanding that law is embedded in the societal context in which it operates.
Current research interests
Hilda's current research examines how we should conceptualise autonomy in the regulation of mental healthcare in the context of low-resource settings in the Global South, with a particular focus on Tanzania. Her research argues for a relational conceptualisation of autonomy that is informed by core tenets of Ubuntu philosophy (such as communal support, solidarity (Ujamaa) and inclusion,) socially constitutive accounts of autonomy (SCAs) in feminist theory (which recognise the role of oppression towards the erosion of autonomy) and properly takes into account the legacy of coloniality in mental healthcare institutions and professional practices. Drawing on this three-pronged conceptual approach her research aims to offer a more nuanced and comprehensive approach to understanding how best to promote autonomy in the Tanzanian mental healthcare context.Past research interests
1. Implementation of the Maputo Protocol (African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa) in Tanzania: Challenges and Prospects, undergraduate research at the University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (2014). 2.The treatment of gender issues and development in the Sierra Leonean Transitional Justice Context, postgraduate research at the University of Western Cape, South Africa (2017). 3. The scope and application of universal jurisdiction at the International Law Seminar on behalf of the International Law Commission at UN Geneva, Switzerland. (2018). 3. A quantitative study on the mental health challenges facing students and staff at the University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania (2021).Knowledge exchange
1. Co-developer - Decolonising Academic Knowledge at the University of Edinburgh
Hilda is currently a co-developer and contributor to the "Decolonising Academic Knowledge" Challenge Course being developed at the University of Edinburgh. This trans- disciplinary course provides a foundation for students on understanding the concept of decolonisation and enable to students identify and critically reflect upon ongoing coloniality within their current disciplines including medicine, architecture, engineering, the arts and humanities. The course explores pertinent themes to decolonisation of academic knowledge including modernity, Southern epistemologies, coloniality, the mental architecture of racism, race and its implications in academia and the generation of academic knowledge.
2. Research Associate - Decolonisation and the impact agenda
This research project explores the intersection between decolonisation and the impact agenda, and to consider the implications this has for our Knowledge, Exchange Impact (KEI) activities within the College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences (CAHSS) (and the wider University).The proposed initiative aligns with strategic aims of the University in the area of decolonisation, including its commitment to address contemporary and historic racism.While there has been a focus on efforts to decolonise the curriculum,we propose that similar attention should be paid to anti-colonial scholarship and practice in relation to the impact agenda.Our starting point is that consideration of decolonisation and the impact agenda is not a matter that is only relevant to a sub-set of specific projects within the University – for example, typically where researchers at a Global North institution are working with participants in a Global South setting. While there may be lessons to be learned from such projects, to overly focus on individual examples risks overlooking the structures within which all research impact is carried out and that informs how we frame, measure and think about research impact more broadly. Rather, decolonial thought urges us to look at the bigger picture and consider broader questions of extraction and exploitation, and their impact on how and where knowledge is produced and deployed to create change in the world
Conference details
Third UK and Ireland Mental Diversity Law Conference held on 6th- 7th July 2023 at the University of Nottingham.
Presented on Anti-colonial approaches to autonomy in the regulation of mental healthcare in the Global South at the International Academy of Law and Mental Health held on 20th-24th July 2024 in Barcelona, Spain.
Invited speaker
Presented a paper on "Anti-colonial Approaches to Autonomy in the Regulation of Mental Healthcare in the Global South" at the International Academy for Law and Mental Health in 2024, Spain, Barcelona.