Christina Murray

Christina Murray is a professor of constitutional and human rights law at the University of Cape Town, South Africa. Between March 2009 and October 2010 she served on the Kenyan Committee of Experts appointed by the Kenyan parliament to draft a new constitution for Kenya. That constitution was approved by Kenyans in a referendum and promulgated on 27 August 2010.

Murray's project will use Kenya as a case study to explore a number of questions central to constitution-making in societies emerging from conflict including: when in a conflict resolution process is attention to constitution-making appropriate; the preconditions for moving from 'entry level' constitutional negotiations to writing a constitution; when wholesale constitutional replacement should be undertaken and when a partial review of the constitution is wiser (or safer); why, how, when and to what extent the people should be involved in a constitution-making process and how popular involvement can be balanced with the accommodation of elites; when international or foreign intervention is appropriate; and the implications of different methods of adopting constitutions.

Murray's first involvement in constitution-making was in South Africa. Between 1994 and 1996 she served on the panel of seven experts advising the South African Constitutional Assembly in drafting South Africa's 'final' constitution. After her work with the South African Constitutional Assembly she worked with multiple government departments in South Africa, the national parliament and a number of the new provincial legislatures on implementing the constitution. She has also contributed to constitution-making in Southern Sudan and Nepal.

• with R. Simeon. "Recognition without Empowerment: Minorities in a Democratic South Africa" in Constitutional Design for Divided Societies: Integration or Accommodation? ed. Choudhry, Sujit (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008)
• with Catherine Maywald. "Sub-national Constitution-Making in Southern Sudan" Rutgers Law Journal, 2006.
• with R. Simeon and A. Handley. "Learning to Lose, Learning to Win: Government and Opposition in South Africa's Transition to Democracy" in Political Transitions in Dominant Party Systems: Learning to Lose, ed. J. Wong et al (London: Routledge, 2008)
• with Michelle O'Sullivan, eds. Advancing Women's Rights: The First Decade of Democracy (Cape Town: Juta, 2005)