Christina Murray is currently living in Oxford, UK. She is a visiting fellow at Kellogg College. Between 2014 and 2024 (excluding 2016), she served as a senior member of the Mediation Support Standby Team of the United Nations’ Department of Political and Peacemaking Affairs with a focus on constitutions and power-sharing. In this position she provided advice and support to peace-making and constitution-making processes in a range of countries, including Sudan and South Sudan, Yemen, Papua New Guinea (in relation to Bougainville), The Gambia, Tunisia, Libya, Chile and Somalia.

Prof Murray's first experience in constitution-making was serving on a panel of seven experts advising the South African Constitutional Assembly in drafting South Africa's 'final' Constitution between 1994 and 1996. After that she advised a number of South African government departments on the implementation of the new system of multi-level government and worked with South Africa's national Parliament and many of its nine provincial legislatures. 

Between February 2009 and October 2010, Christina served as a member of the Kenyan Committee of Experts appointed by the Kenyan Parliament to draft a new Constitution of Kenya. That Constitution became law in Kenya on 27 August 2010. In 2012, she served as a member of the Constitution Commission of Fiji.

Christina has taught and written on human rights law (and particularly issues relating to gender equality, violence against women, constitutional rights for women and African customary law), international law, and constitutional law (including systems of government, multilevel government, fiscal federalism and traditional leadership). More recent teaching has included a summer school course on Constitution Building in Africa at the Central European Univesrity, in Budapest. Between 1992 and 2004 she was director of UCT's Law, Race and Gender Research Unit (now the Centre for Law & Society). She was head of the Department of Public Law at the University of Cape Town from 2002 - 2008 and Deputy Dean of the Law Faculty from 2000 - 2002.

 Christina's CV

Recent publications 

‘Global standards on judicial independence and removal: Grappling with vetting and fresh appointment’ (with Jan van Zyl Smit) forthcoming 2024 Comparative Constitutional Studies.

'Shaping the Post-Conflict Landscape? The Role of Constitutions in Natural Resource Governance' with Kimana Zulueta-Fülscher (2024 Stockholm: International IDEA) Shaping the Post-Conflict Landscape? The Role of Constitutions in Natural Resource Governance | International IDEA

‘Making and re-making Kenya’s Constitution’ in Tom Ginsburg and Sumit Bisarya (eds) Constitution Makers on Constitution Making (2022, Cambridge University Press) 37-76.

‘Political Elites and the People: Kenya’s Decade-Long Constitution-Making Process’ in Gabriel Negretto (ed) Redrafting Constitutions in Democratic Regimes (2020, Cambridge University Press) 190 - 216.

‘Presidential term limits and the African Union’ (with Micha Wiebusch) (2019) 63(S1) Journal of African Law 131-160. doi:10.1017/S0021855319000056 open access available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-african-law/article/presidential-term-limits-and-the-african-union/1F134034E67D93524560D31A067779B7.

‘Presidential Term Limits and the International Community’ (with Eric Alston and Micha Wiebusch) in Alexander Baturo and Robert Elgie (eds) Politics of Presidential Term Limits forthcoming 2019, Oxford University Press.

‘The reform of South Africa’s security sector in the context of the transition to democracy’ (with Richard Stacey) in Security Sector Reform and Constitutional Transitions, forthcoming 2019, Oxford University Press.

‘Power-sharing in Kenya: Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea’ (with Nic Cheeseman) in Power-sharing: Empirical and Normative Challenges ed Allison McCulloch and John McGarry (Routledge, London: 2017) 36 – 62.

‘International agencies, constitution-making and gender’ (with Cindy Wittke) in Gender and Constitutions ed Helen Irving (Edward Elgar, Sydney: 2017) 107 – 131.

‘National Dialogues in 2013’ (2014) Constitution Building: A Global Review 2013 (International Idea) pp 11 – 15. Online at: https://www.idea.int/sites/default/files/publications/constitution-building-a-global-review-2013.pdf

‘Systems of government’ (with Denis Baranger) Handbook on Constitutional Law ed mark Tushnet, Cheryl Saunders and Thomas Fleiner (Routledge 2013) 73 - 84

‘Yemen’s National Dialogue Conference’ Anayasa Hukuku Dergisi/Constitutional Law Review (Turkey) 2013

"South Africa : Promises Unmet, Multilevel Government in South Africa" (with Richard Simeon) in Rekha Saxena (ed) Varieties of Federal Governance (2010 Foundation Books, Cambridge University Press)

'Reforming multilevel government in South Africa' (with Richard Simeon) (2009) 43 Canadian Journal of African Studies 536 - 571.

'Learning to Lose, Learning to Win: Government and Opposition in South Africa' Transition to Democracy' (with Richard Simeon and Antoinette Handley) ed J Wong et al Political Transitions in Dominant Party Systems: Learning to Lose (Routledge 2008).

'Subnational Constitution-Making in Southern Sudan' (2006) 37 Rutgers Law Journal 1203-1234 (with Catherine Maywald) 

'South Africa' in Legislative, Executive and Judicial Governance in Federal Countries ed C Saunders and K le Roy (McGill-Queens University Press) (2006) 258-288.

'Traditional Leaders' (with Tom Bennett) in Constitutional Law of South Africa eds Woolman & Roux (2006) pp 26-I-26-67.

'South African's Troubled Royalty: Traditional Leaders after Democracy' Law and Policy Paper 23 (The Federation Press in association with the Centre for International and Public Law, Faculty of Law, the Australian National University) 2004

"Provincial Constitutions in South Africa: The (non)Example of the Western Cape" (2001) Neue Folge Band 49 Jahrbuch des offentlichen Rechts 481 - 512.