Conservation of Tanzanian Cultural Built Heritage: Perceptions of Heritage Professionals

The purpose of the research is to gain a greater understanding of what drives the conservation of cultural built heritage as well as to explore stakeholders’ perspectives regarding the nature of decision-making in Tanzania, the diversity of issues that motivate the transformation of significant heritage values and the interventions that act as barriers to conservation management. A qualitative data analysis was conducted using data collected from focus groups and interviews in Tanzania. It was found that the decision-making process regarding conservation of built heritage is unreliable i.e. stakeholders were less aware of the process involved in conservation of cultural built heritage in Tanzania than they thought they were. It was also found that political position and power cause much of the complexity in the heritage sector. The paper rep-resents stakeholders’ perceived factors impacting the decision-making process in the conservation of built heritage. The paper includes implications for the development of a decision-making framework that could help address different stakeholder perceptions directed towards safeguarding Tanzania’s cultural built heritage for future generations. An original empirical investigation is used to propose an analytical decision-making framework; it helps to elucidate the management issues and challenges as well as enhancing sustainability in the conservation of cultural built heritage.