ABSTRACT
Hybridity can be used as a lens to deconstruct abuses of human rights in order to understand their structural causes. This chapter describes the structural causes of human rights abuses and examines the content of the belief in child witches and a number of posited explanations for the belief. It analyses the belief in 'child witches' first as a hybrid of Christian and traditional African beliefs, then as the product of a structural hybridity created by the growth of charismatic churches in West Africa with a strong commercial outlook. The American model of evangelical churches is predicated on those churches growing continuously. Charismatic churches in both Africa and the United States preach a 'prosperity doctrine' in which the teachings of the gospel are a path to wealth and success. In both Africa and the United States healing, visions, confession and accusation form an essential part of charismatic church services.
