TLDR: The University of Johannesburg (UJ) highlights the urgent need for South Africa to establish a special commission dedicated to the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) and law reform. Authored by UJ’s Vice-Chancellor Letlhokwa George Mpedi and Professor Arthur Mutambara, the article argues that existing legal structures, like the South African Law Reform Commission (SALRC), are not agile enough to address the rapid advancements and complex ethical, social, and economic implications of technologies like Artificial Intelligence (AI). The proposed commission would create a dynamic governance framework, balancing innovation with the safeguarding of constitutional rights and social equity, ensuring South Africa keeps pace with global technological shifts.
An opinion piece by Letlhokwa George Mpedi, Vice-Chancellor and Principal of the University of Johannesburg (UJ), and Arthur Mutambara, Full Professor and Director of the Institute for the Future of Knowledge at UJ, advocates for the urgent establishment of a special commission dedicated to the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) and law reform in South Africa. The article, which first appeared in Mail & Guardian on July 8, 2025, underscores the critical need for a dynamic governance framework to navigate the complexities of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and other emerging technologies.
The authors highlight that AI governance involves a delicate balance of dilemmas, including the trade-offs between opportunity and risk, security and transparency, globalization and localization, and self-regulation versus government control. They assert that effective AI governance frameworks must integrate innovation, ethics, public safety, and fairness as technologies evolve, necessitating flexible, inclusive, context-aware, and predictive policies. Multi-stakeholder cooperation among governments, commerce, academia, and civil society is deemed essential for robust and adaptable regulatory frameworks.
Despite the global imperative for a dynamic governance structure to adapt to AI advancements, South Africa is noted for having ‘fallen woefully behind in our response.’ This necessitates a new legislative model that can keep pace with the rapidly shifting technological landscape. The article emphasizes that AI’s fast-changing nature demands a dynamic governance framework that allows regulatory structures to adapt to rapid technological changes, diverse applications, and evolving societal impacts. Such adaptability ensures regulations remain relevant without stifling innovation, enabling risk-based regulations that differentiate between low-risk and high-risk AI applications.
Furthermore, the authors address the ethical and social concerns raised by AI, such as bias, privacy, and accountability. A flexible governance model is proposed to incorporate ethical considerations into policy over time, preventing reliance on potentially outdated standards. Given the global nature of AI development, governance frameworks must accommodate diverse legal, social, and cultural contexts, fostering international collaboration and harmonizing standards to reduce regulatory fragmentation across borders.
Engaging a wide range of stakeholders—including developers, users, governments, and civil society—is crucial for creating inclusive policies. A dynamic governance model can also effectively respond to specific risks like cybersecurity vulnerabilities, job displacement, and unintended consequences of autonomous systems through targeted measures. Building public trust through transparent and adaptive governance is identified as vital for the widespread adoption of AI technologies.
The article references the 2020 Presidential Commission on the Fourth Industrial Revolution (PC4IR) report, which called for ‘Radical innovation to deliver the required speed in enacting legislation.’ However, five years later, the ‘required speed’ has been static. Traditional legislative processes are inherently slow, and existing legal structures, formed before the advent of AI, could not anticipate machines mimicking human intelligence or algorithms making life-and-death decisions.
Vice-Chancellor Mpedi advocates for a shift from reactive to anticipatory legislation, echoing American legal scholar Lawrence Lessig’s observation that ‘Law and technology produce, together, a kind of regulation of creativity we’ve not seen before.’ While the existing South African Law Reform Commission (SALRC), established in 1973, has been historically impactful in traditional law reform, its program-based model is considered insufficiently agile or interdisciplinary for the rapid shifts brought about by 4IR technologies.
Therefore, a special commission dedicated exclusively to 4IR and law reform is argued to be ‘not only justified but urgently necessary.’ This proposed body would bring together legal scholars, technologists, ethicists, economists, and policymakers to proactively anticipate and respond to complex legal and regulatory challenges. It would operate with the necessary speed, adaptability, and breadth of expertise, existing in tandem with the SALRC but focusing specifically on accelerating technological change and its profound implications.
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Concluding with the Greek philosopher Heraclitus’s adage, ‘There is nothing permanent except change,’ the authors assert that societies and their governing laws must evolve with the times. A special commission on 4IR and law reform is presented as a necessary institutional evolution that South Africa cannot afford to overlook.
