The Constitutional Assembly was tasked with writing a new constitution for a non-racial South Africa within two years of its first sitting. It was the final deciding body of the contents of the new constitutional text.

This series includes audio recordings of Constitutional Assembly meetings, submission, reports, draft constitutional texts, bills and other materials from the structures of the Constitutional Assembly. Many if these materials were prepared by the Constitutional Committee.

The Constitutional Assembly created several structures to assist in fulfilling its mandate, of which the Constitutional Committee was primary. The Constitutional Committee functioned as the primary negotiating and driving body of the Constitutional Assembly. Other structures were outlined and required by the Interim Constitution (Act 200 of 1993: Constitution of the Republic of South Africa).

The Constitutional Assembly determined that the constitution-making process would be an integrated and transparent one. Integration required that the ideas of political parties in the Constitutional Assembly, civil society and the broader public be considered.

Integration was a significant task of the theme committees in receiving and processing public submissions. Transparency was facilitated by requiring all meetings of the Constitutional Assembly and its structures to be open to the public and the media.

Membership for the Constitutional Committee and theme committees were drawn directly from the Constitutional Assembly.

The Constitutional Committee was responsible for creating refined working drafts of the constitution and incorporating amendments adopted by the Constitutional Assembly. The Constitutional Committee acted as both a negotiating forum and a driving body of the Constitutional Assembly.

The series Constitutional Committee contains the working documents of the Constitutional Committee, audio recordings of Constitutional Committee meetings and reports submitted to it from all other structures of the Constitutional Assembly. Drafts bills, amendments, and reports on contentious issues and debates can be found in this series.

As a negotiating body the Constitutional Committee created sub-committees and ad hoc committees to assist in negotiating and drafting. Primary among these was the Constitutional Committee Sub-committee which dealt with substantive issues that the Constitutional Committee was unable to process because of time constraints.

As the driving body of the constitution-making process, it supervised the establishment of the theme committees and related structures such as technical committees, formed the Management Committee, and outlined the work plan for the Constitutional Assembly and its structures.

The Constitutional Committee Sub-committee was created by and reported directly to the Constitutional Committee. The Sub-committee was created to deal with substantive issues that the Constitutional Committee was unable to process because of time constraints. These issues largely relate to specific formulations - of principle previously agreed to - into the constitutional text. Its tasks included facilitating drafting, negotiating and the formation of further sub-committees as required.

The series Constitutional Committee Sub-committee contains the working documents of the committee, draft formulations and audio recordings of their meetings.

The Management Committee was responsible for matters of process. It implemented tasks of the Constitutional Committee, oversaw the Administration unit, and monitored the media and public participation. This series contains the Management Committees’ working documents, and audio recordings of their meetings.

Management Committee tasks included:

• preparing agendas for Constitutional Committee meeting
• preparing reports to be considered by the Constitutional Committee
• co-ordinating the activities of the theme committees
• co-ordinating the activities of all structures of Constitutional Assembly
• attending, between meetings of the Constitutional Committee, to the day-to-day management and overseeing of developments in the structures.

This series contains ephemera produced for public outreach such as posters, and Constitutional Talk Radio. Materials produced by advertising agencies as pitches for selection and their subsequent programming can also be found here.

Steering Committee contains audio recordings of Steering Committee meetings. This committee was created by and reported to the Constitutional Assembly. It was primarily concerned with budgeting, planning and the creation of operational rules between May and August 1994.

Sub-committees contain documents and audio recordings of the majority of sub-committees and ad hoc committees. Sub-committees were created by the Constitutional Committee Sub-committee or the Constitutional Committee.

Sub-committees typically dealt with drafting and negotiation of particular issues identified as lacking consensus by theme committees. Each sub-committee consisted of six members drawn from the relevant theme committee and supplemented with technical advisers and Constitutional Assembly members if needed.

Other Sub-committees and ad hoc committees were created as part of multilateral negotiation processes, most notably the Arniston Multilateral.

Sub-committee 1 and Sub-committee 2 were created by the Constitutional Committee to address issues raised by the Constitutional Court decision to not certify the constitution on 6 September 1996. Audio recordings and meeting minutes are available in sub-series Sub-committee 1 and Sub-committee 2.

Theme Committees contain submissions made to theme committees, summaries thereof, the documents of core groups and reports from technical teams assigned to each theme committee. Audio recordings of the committee meetings can be found in their relevant sub-series.

Theme committees were responsible for the integration of ideas from political parties, civil society and the general public into the constitution-making process. Theme committees reported to the Constitutional Committee and Management Committee oversaw theme committee report writing. Their membership was drawn from the Constitutional Assembly.

Reports created by theme committees included details of non-contentious issues, contentious issues and suggested approaches but excluded debates, negotiations or resolutions which was the function of the Constitutional Committee and Constitutional Assembly.

Occasionally theme committee members were drawn on by the Constitutional Committee and Constitutional Sub-committee to draft and negotiate parts of the constitutional text as part of sub-committees and ad hoc committees.

Functions of the Theme Committees included:

• Receiving and collating views from the broader community on the Constitution
• Receiving submissions from the political parties
• Developing and processing these concepts and views
• Referring processed views for technical drafting
• Submitting the processed concepts in the form of reports to the Constitutional Committee for debate in the Constitutional Assembly.

There are six theme committees, each with their own dedicated topic. Theme Committee 6 was allowed by the Constitutional Assembly to create several sub-theme committees due to the significant differentiated and non-overlapping topics related to its theme.

The themes are:

• Theme Committee 1: Character of Democratic State
• Theme Committee 2: Structure of Government
• Theme Committee 3: Relationship Between Levels of Government
• Theme Committee 4: Fundamental Rights
• Theme Committee 5: Judiciary and Legal Systems
• Theme Committee 6: Specialised Structure of Government
• Sub-Theme Committee 6.1: Public Administration
• Sub-Theme Committee 6.2: Financial and Public Enterprise institutions
• Sub-Theme Committee 6.3: Transformation and Monitoring
• Sub-Theme Committee 6.4: Security apparatus

Each theme committee had a core group and a supporting technical committee. The core groups were responsible for co-ordinating and managing the work programmes of their respective theme committees. Technical committees were drawn from experts external to the Constitutional Assembly to advise theme committees.