Case studies / 02
More than 1,000 South African laws mapped to the powers and functions they assign
For Palmer Development Group's work for COGTA, we are building the research data behind a review of how powers and functions are allocated across national, provincial and local government.
- Client
- Palmer Development Group
- For
- COGTA
- Period
- July 2026 to date. Two-year project
- Our role
- Research data team under a work order
- Service
- Data System Build, delivered as block days
- Status
- Active
The problem
The question was simple to ask and hard to answer: which sphere of government, which institution and which official is responsible for each function, according to the law itself?
The starting point was a list of Acts, amending Acts and regulations spanning decades. One Act can hold several separate powers, assigned to different institutions and officials. There was no single place showing those powers, the constitutional schedule they fall under, or the text that assigns them.
What we did
We logged every law and its official source text, with a stable identifier for each. The database structure was designed before extraction started, so that source facts, draft mappings and review fields sat in separate places.
Each law was broken into individual records for powers, duties and roles, and each record was linked to the passage that supports it. Records that needed legal or policy judgement were flagged for review instead of being given a default answer.
From the database we wrote a report for every schedule area and residual group, compiled them into a compendium, and wrote an analytical report on the compendium as a whole. Palmer Development Group's specialists edited that material for use with their client.
What we built
- A law and source register with official source texts
- 207 structured datasets, including schedule mapping, theme mapping, a function register, a residual function register and regulations
- 98 reports by schedule area (Schedule 4 Part A and B, Schedule 5 Part A and B, and residual functions), compiled into one compendium
- An analytical report on the compendium
- A query workspace loaded with the project data, so the team can ask questions of it
- A web portal in Palmer Development Group's branding, where the team can browse the data and download charts for reports
The work in figures
- 1,124 sources logged
- 207 structured datasets
- 98 schedule-area reports in one compendium
The project is ongoing, so these figures keep growing.
What changed
The team moved from a list of laws to a database in which each mapping can be checked against the passage that supports it, without re-reading the Act. The same data feeds the compendium, the portal and the charts in client reports.
Limits
This is research data, not legal advice. Mappings are reviewed and edited by Palmer Development Group's specialists before they are used.