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South Africa
Constitutional Law and Human Rights

• Abahali baseMjondolo: South African Shackdwellers' Movement, 2005-- (Durban, South Africa)
  An NGO in the South African "Poor People's Alliance." The site --in English and IsiZulu-- includes an archive of news reports, photos, videos, press releases, and organizational documents. "[Begun in Durban in early 2005] in terms of the numbers of people mobilised, [it claims to be] the largest organisation of the militant poor in post-apartheid South Africa."
  
  
• ACCORD: African Centre for the Constructive Resolution of Disputes (Durban, South Africa)
  • "[Founded in 1991] The African Centre for the Constructive Resolution of Disputes (ACCORD) is an international civil-society organisation working throughout Africa to bring appropriate African solutions to the challenges posed by conflict on our continent."
  • Conflict trends. (Online) -- Mt. Edgecombe, Durban, South Africa: ACCORD, 1998-
  
  
• African Gender Institute, University of Cape Town (Rondebosch, South Africa)
  • "The AGI's Vision of Africa as a continent liberated from the legacies of colonial and patriarchal domination..." The site offers information about academic and activist programmes, a newsletter, and other online publications.
    
    
  • Gender and Women's Studies for Africa's Transformation
    • "The project will strengthen African teaching and research in gender studies by bringing teachers and researchers based in African universities together in a series of carefully-designed training, research and publishing activities, involving a combination of online communications and workshops. ...This enhanced capacity will result in a pool of locally-grounded gender competent personnel equipped with the analytical and policy advocacy skills required to ensure the delivery of gender justice in African contexts."
    • Womens' organising activities: Announcements, conferences, contact info, and links
    • Feminist knowledge: essays, bibliographies, policy papers, issues analysis, etc.
    
    
  • Feminist Africa. (Online) -- Cape Town, South Africa: AGI, 2002--
    This site offers the current issue and the small archive. "Feminist Africa provides a forum for progressive, cutting-edge gender research and feminist dialogue focused on the continent. By prioritising intellectual rigor, the journal seeks to challenge the technocratic fragmentation resulting from donor-driven and narrowly developmentalist work on gender in Africa."
  • AGI's Electronic Gender Links
  • See also: Gender Links below
  
  
• African Human Security Initiative (Institute for Security Studies, Pretoria, South Africa)
  • "This [one-year] project is for a core network of seven established African NGOs to embark upon a process of benchmarking the performance of key African governments in respect of human security issues, measured against the commitments taken at the level at OAU/AU heads of state meetings."
  • African post-conflict reconstruction policy framework (June 2005) By NEPAD Secretariat, Governance, Peace and Security Programme. PDF format. See also: French version.
  • African commitments to human rights: a review of eight NEPAD countries. (2004) By Giliane Cherubin-Doumbia. Table of contents, plus full-text in PDF format
  • African commitments to democracy in theory and practice: a review of eight NEPAD countries. (2004) By Anne Hammerstad. Table of contents, plus full-text in PDF format
  • Human security in Africa: a conceptual framework for review. (2004) By Jakkie Cilliers. PDF format
  
  
• Alternative Information and Development Centre (2006) (Mowbray, Johannesburg, South Africa)
  • An archive of news, reports, and calls to action from the movement in South Africa for debt cancellation and global social justice.
  • Mobilisation
  • Third World Debt
  • Gender
  
  
• Amnesty International on South Africa, 2007-- (USA)
  Annual reports and news releases from AI regarding the rights of prisoners and other human rights.
  
  
• Carnegie Commission on Preventing Deadly Conflict. A house no longer divided: progress and prospects for democratic peace in South Africa. (Online). By John Stremlau. -- Washington, DC: Carnegie Commission of New York, July 1997. via Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.
  
  
• Centre for Civil Society, University of Natal--Durban (South Africa)
  • "The Centre for Civil Society was established in the Faculty of Community and Development Disciplines in July 2001 ... committed to the following vision: strengthening the non-profit and voluntary sector by disseminating information to the sector itself, and by building networks and encouraging collaboration both within the sector and between it and researchers and teachers in Higher Education institutions around the country..."
  • Views and analysis
  • CCS Research Reports
  
  
• Centre for Conflict Resolution, University of Cape Town (Rondebosch, South Africa)
  • The site offers general information about the research projects, other activities, and publications of the centre---online journals and reports. "[Founded in 1968, formerly Centre for Intergroup Studies] the CCR seeks to contribute towards a just peace in South Africa and elsewhere in Africa by promoting constructive, creative and co-operative approaches to the resolution of conflict and the reduction of violence."
  
  
• Centre for Human Rights--University of Pretoria (South Africa)
  
  
• Centre for Rural Legal Studies (Stellenbosch, South Africa)
  The website offers information about projects and contacts; plus related links. "The CRLS promotes the land and labour interests of men and women farm workers in the Western, Eastern and Northern Cape through training, information dissemination, research, advocacy, legal intervention and development facilitation."
  
  
• Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation (Johannesburg, South Africa)
  • The CSVR site includes an extensive library of online reports and news on various topics relating to South African civil society, criminal justice, security, and human rights; plus a lengthy list of related web links. "[Founded in 1989] The CSVR is a multi-disciplinary South African non-governmental organisation....dedicated to making a meaningful contribution to peaceful and fundamental transformation in South Africa, and in the Southern African region."
  • CSVR research and publications
  
  
• Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative on South Africa, 2001-2005 (New Delhi, India; London, UK; Accra, Ghana)
  CHRI reports and excerpts from South African news media. "The CHRI is a non-partisan independent international non-governmental organisation. Human rights education and advocacy are at the core of all CHRI's activities, and the aims and ends of its reports and investigations."
  
  
• Community Agency for Social Enquiry (CASE) (Braamfontein, Johannesburg, South Africa)
  • "The CASE is an applied research NGO, working in the socio-economic, political and development fields in South Africa. Established in 1985 and operating nationally, CASE has staff members in Gauteng, the Western Cape, and KwaZulu-Natal. Its Board of Directors consists of representatives of NGOs, churches, and business, as well as senior academics and civil servants."
  • CASE Home Page
  
  
• The Constitution of the Republic of South Africa (1996) (via South African Government Information)
  In English: as adopted by the Constitutional Assembly on May 8 1996, amended October 11, 1996, and signed by President Nelson Mandela on December 10, 1996; plus links to previous constitutions of the 1990s and related information.
  
  
• Constitution News: An Information Bulletin of the African National Congress -- Johannesburg : African National Congress, National Constitutional Commission, 1995-96.
  'Constitution News was distributed fortnightly by the ANC's National Constitutional Commission to keep ANC, Alliance and MDM structures informed of developments in the constitution-making process.'
  
  
• DeRebus: SA Attorney's journal. (Online) -- Pretoria: DeRebus, 1998--
  The online version of the monthly journal on South African legal issues, with a back issues archive; plus legal links.
  
  
• Elections in South Africa 2009
  • Electoral Institute of Southern Africa on 2009 South African Elections (Johannesburg, South Africa)
    
    
  • Independent Electoral Commission (South Africa)
    -- Lists of Candidates by Political Party
    -- Voting Information
    
    
  • Mail & Guardian (Online): "South Africa Votes 2009" (Johannesburg, South Africa)
    
    
  • News24 on Elections 2009 (Johannesburg, South Africa)
    
    
  • Pambazuka News on "South Africa's 2009 National Elections: Waiting to Exhale" (April 16, 2009) (Oxford, UK; Cape Town, South Africa)
    
    
  • Political Parties in South Africa -- Official Web Sites
    
    
  • Polity.Org.Za on "Election News in Review -- 2009" (via Creamer Media, South Africa)
    
    
  • "South African Elections 2009" Web Dossier: an online bibliography of publications and other resources on South African elections since 1994. African Studies Centre, Leiden University, Library, Documentation and Information Department (Leiden, The Netherlands)
    
  
  
• Electoral Institute of Southern Africa (Johannesburg, South Africa)
  "The Electoral Institute of Southern Africa (EISA) is an independent, non-governmental organisation whose focus of concern is elections, electoral practices and the promotion of democratic governance. EISA's vision is to support the quest for sustainable democracy throughout South and Southern Africa by promoting free and fair elections and a popular appreciation of democratic principles and practices."
  
  
• Freedom of Expression Institute of South Africa (Johannesburg)
  • "...FXI was formed in January 1994 from a merger of two organisations involved in campaigning for freedom of expression during the apartheid years, namely the Campaign for Open Media (COM) and the Anti-Censorship Action Group (ACAG). Recently, the FXI also established the Media Defence Fund to sponsor freedom of expression court cases on behalf of media who are not able to afford the legal costs."
  • FXI publications archive
  
  
• Gender Links (Johannesburg, South Africa)
  • "GL is committed to a Southern Africa in which women and men are able to participate equally in all aspects of public and private life...achieved through three closely linked programmes: media, governance and gender justice."
  • Publications
    -- SADC Gender & Development Protocol Campaign (2008)
    -- HIV and AIDS Gender Baseline Study: a media survey in Southern African countries
    -- Southern Africa Gender Justice Barometer (e-newsletter)
  
  
• Human Rights Institute of South Africa (Braamfontein, Johannesburg, South Africa)
  "[Since 1994]...HURISA is an NGO that offers professional services towards the promotion of a human rights culture, peace and democracy...in South Africa and on the continent." The site features information about training and research programs, selected publications of HURISA, plus:
  -- "The Goldstone Commission" (The Commission of Inquiry Regarding the Prevention of Public Violence and Intimidation), 1991-1994
  -- Related web links
  
  
  
• Human Rights Watch on South Africa (New York & Washington, DC)
  --Neighbors in need: Zimbabweans seeking refuge in South Africa (June 2008) -- New York: HRW, 2008. 120 pages in PDF format
  -- "Keep your head down"unprotected migrants in South Africa (February 2007) -- New York: HRW, 2007. 117 pages in PDF format
  -- Forgotten schools: right to basic education for children on farms in South Africa (June 2004) -- New York: HRW, 2004. 61 pages in PDF format
  -- South Africa, 2002. In Human Rights Watch World Report 2003. (Online).
  -- South Africa, 2001. In Human Rights Watch World Report 2002. (Online).
  -- Unequal protection: the state response to violent crime on South African farms (August 2001). -- New York : Human Rights Watch, 2001.
  -- South Africa: a question of principle, arms trade and human rights (October 2000). Human Rights Watch report (Online) ; vol. 12, no. 5(A).
  -- South Africa, 2000. In Human Rights Watch World Report 2001. (Online).
  -- South Africa, 1999. In Human Rights Watch World Report 2000. (Online).
  -- South Africa, 1998-99. In Human Rights Watch World Report 1999. (Online).
  -- South Africa, 1997-98. In Human Rights Watch World Report 1998. (Online).
  
  
• Idasa: Institute for Democracy in South Africa (Cape Town, South Africa)
  The website provides information about the activities of the institute, plus access to selections from various publications. "Idasa's mission is to promote a sustainable democracy in South Africa by building democratic institutions, educating citizens and advocating social justice."
  
  
• Independent Electoral Commission (IEC), South Africa
  Current news on elections and related constitutional issues. "The new Electoral Commission was established in terms of Chapter 9 of the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa and the Electoral Commission Act 51 of 1996. The Electoral Commission Act provides for an open and transparent process for the nomination of Electoral Commissioners in order to ensure the constitutionally guaranteed independence of the Commission."
  
  
• The Institute for Justice and Reconciliation (Cape Town, South Africa)
  • "The Institute for Justice and Reconciliation was launched in May 2000 and is self-consciously located in post-TRC (Truth and Reconciliation Commission) South Africa. The Institute is committed to using the insights generated through its work in South Africa to engage in dialogue with other African countries."
  • Publications on "transitional justice" in South Africa and elsewhere in Africa
  
  
• Land Rights in South Africa
  • South Africa. Department of Land Affairs (Pretoria)
    • The government home page, with current news and a selection of legistlative and policy documents. See also:
    • Commission on Restitution of Land Rights
  
  
• Lawyers for Human Rights (Pretoria, South Africa)
  • The website features information about LHR services and programs; plus human rights news. "Started in 1979, LHR [a non-profit NGO] rapidly achieved a proud record of fighting oppression and abuse of human rights under apartheid. LHR later helped usher in the transition to democracy through its voter education and monitoring in 1994."
  • LHR Publications
  • LHR on Refugee Rights
  
  
• LegalB's South African Legislation Database Resources for Africa--Law of Africa (Johannesburg, South Africa)
  A private law firm offers this searchable index to selected online South African legislation (historical and current), with free access to tables of contents, summaries, and unamended texts.
  Warning: For many documents, access to the full text may be obtainable only upon request from the firm.
  
  
• Parliamentary bulletin. (Online)--Archive. -- South Africa : African National Congress, 1997-2000.
  "Parliamentary Bulletin is a briefing for ANC Parliamentarians, to inform on key policy and political campaigning issues. It is intended to be a mini-fact file, a summary of important points and a guide to the key political lines that ANC Parliamentarians should be using in their public statements, speeches, articles and press releases."
  
  
• Polity.Org.Za: Policy and Law Online News (via Creamer Media, South Africa)
  SA government draft bills, bills, acts, notices, policy documents, speeches, and government policy-related news.
  
  
• Potchefstroom electronic law journal. (Online) -- Potchefstroom, South Africa: Potchefstroomse Universiteit vir Christelike Hoër Onderwys, 1998--
  Current issue and an archive of back issues. The site can be viewed in English or in Afrikaans --- most of the articles are in Afrikaans, with English language summaries.
  
  
• South Africa -- Government, Foreign Policy, and Political Parties (Compiled by Columbia University Libraries.)
  
  
• South African Law Reform Commission (Pretoria)
  This site provides access to information on the work of the Commission and an online library of annual reports, bulletins, issue and discussion papers, other reports and research papers.
  
  
• South African Constitutional Assembly (via University of Cape Town, Faculty of Law)
  • SA Constitutional Assembly Home Page
  • South African constitutional documents for 1992-1994 WORD format documents
  
  
• South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) (Johannesburg, South Africa)
  • "The SAHRC is ... [a] national institution, which derives its powers from the Constitution and the Human Rights Commission Act of 1994. The SAHRC works with government, civil society and individuals, both nationally and abroad, to fulfill its Constitutional mandate and serves as both a watchdog and a visible route through which people can access their rights."
  • SAHRC "Investigation into Racism in the Media" (1998-2000)
    See also, August 2000 SAHRC report (PDF format) (via Government of South Africa Online)
  • "Combating Racism: A Nation in Dialogue" -- National Conference on Racism 2000, Johannesburg, South Africa, August 30 - September 2, 2000
    Background reports and news, conference details, etc.
  • SAHRC Annual Reports, 1998--
  
  
• South African Law Resource--Bill of Rights Comparative Law Materials (Columbia University Law School, New York)
  "This website for Bills of Rights Comparative Law Materials provides access to constitutional law cases from jurisdictions around the world. Initially, it was intended for South African jurists, as an aid to interpreting the 1996 Constitution of South Africa. The constitution provides that the Constitutional Court may consider constitutional law from legal systems throughout the world."
  
  
• Southern African Migration Project (Queens University, Kingston, Canada)
  • Commentaries and research reports on migration issues in Southern Africa.
  • See especially: Migration Documents
  
  
• Southern African Research and Documentation Centre (SARDC) (Harare, Zimbabwe)
  • News on "Election '99" in South Africa (June 1999) and other SADC countries (SARDC "Sustainable Democracy" Programme)
  • SARDC Home Page
  
  
• Transparency International South Africa (TI-SA) (Johannesburg)
  • "TI is a non-governmental organisation dedicated to increasing government accountability and curbing both international and national corruption."
  • TI-SA Publications
  • TI Home Page (Germany) for "anti-corruption" news, press releases, etc.
  • TI Bribe Payers Survey for 1999 and 2002
  
  
• Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa Report of 1998, Amnesty Hearings/Decisions, and Final Release of 2003 (South Africa)
  • TRC of South Africa Report, Final Version of March 21, 2003 (via Government of South Africa, Pretoria)
    
    
  • TRC Committee Transcripts (Cape Town, South Africa)
    
    
  • Official TRC Amnesty Transripts: Hearings and Decisions, 1996-2001
    This archive is searchable via the official TRC web site.
    
    
  • University of the Witwatersrand Library, Historical Papers: Traces of Truth--Documents relating to the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission. In association with the South African History Archives Project. (Johannesburg, South Africa)
  
  
• United Nations Struggle Against Apartheid -- Selected Documents, 1946-1994 (African National Congress, South Africa)
  Documents, chronologies, speeches by the chairs of the "UN Special Committee against Apartheid", and articles by E.S. Reddy about the UN and the international anti-apartheid movement.
  
  
• United States. Department of State: South Africa Country Report on Human Rights Practices: 1997 | 1998 | 1999 | 2000 | 2001 | 2002 | 2003 | 2004 | 2005 | 2007 | 2007 | 2008
  
  
• University of Cape Town, Faculty of Law (Cape Town, South Africa)
  
  
• University of KwaZulu- Natal, Faculty of Law (Durban, South Africa)
  
  
• University of Pretoria: Centre for Human Rights (South Africa)
  The web site includes information about degree programs and downloadable publications from the research centre -- journal, reports, occasional papers, etc.
  
  
• University of Witwatersrand Law School Home Page (Johannesburg, South Africa)
  This site includes general information about the Law Faculty, plus: decisions and judgements of the SA Constitutional Court, Supreme Court of Appeal, Labour Court, Land Claims Court, and a link to the SA Law Commission web site.
  
  
• Women's Net (Johannesburg, South Africa)
  General announcements on conferences and events; and internet resouces for women activists on social and economic rights, HIV/AIDS and other health issues, etc. "Women's Net aims to empower South African women to use information and communications technologies (ICTs) towards advancing women's equality. It is a dynamic source of locally generated information and discussion on gender issues."