Within this series can be found the final versions of bills drafted by all bodies of the Multi-Party Negotiating Process (MPNP) as well as resolutions and adoptions of those bills. 

The Multi-Party Negotiation Process Plenary was a widely representative body of South African leaders and political parties who confirmed and amended agreements reached by all other negotiating bodies of the MPNP. It was the highest body of the MPNP. The Multi-Party Negotiating Process had one Plenary on 17 November 1993.

This series primarily contains reference materials from the Convention for a Democratic South Africa (CODESA) used during discussions by various organs of the Multi-Party Negotiating Process and other categorised materials.

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.

The Post-CODESA 2 phase was short-lived. Despite the establishment of several Sub-committees and Task Groups, and the allocation of tasks, all CODESA meetings were suspended at the end of June 1992. This decision was made after a general request for the suspension of meetings, due to the unstable political situation in the country at that stage.

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.

The series Planning Conference contains the materials produced for the meeting of the Multi-party Planning Conference on 5 and 6 March 1993. While draft resolutions of the Planning Conference can be found here, the final resolutions are in the series Negotiating Council. 

This short lived conference focused on planning for a meeting of the Multi-Party Negotiating Forum to be held at the World Trade Centre 1 and 2 April 1993. The conference resolved general terms for consensus, negotiating procedure and that “CODESA” was no longer to be the name of the negotiation process. Twenty six parties and organisations were represented. After the Planning Conference its members dissolved into the then yet to be named Multi-Party Negotiating Process. 

Further planning for the Negotiating Forum meeting continued during March under the direction of the Facilitating Committee and the Sub-committee of the Facilitating Committee. These committees were renamed the Negotiating Council and the Planning Committee.