Three stages of Cameron constitutionalism

The simple thesis of this chapter is that Edwin Cameron’s judicial career can be usefully divided into three stages. In the first stage, he played an important role, as a High Court judge and then on the Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA), in entrenching the new Constitution, which at that stage still faced much resistance among his colleagues. In the second stage, once the Constitution’s entrenchment was complete, Cameron became one of its most powerful and effective exponents, with his encompassing constitutional vision firmly in the ascendancy. In the third stage, that vision began to fracture. As the Constitutional Court changed around him, Cameron was pushed into a more uncomfortable role as a critic and dissenter. I will illustrate these three stages using a selection of Cameron’s most intriguing and important judgments, and thereby tell the story, or a story, of his 25 remarkable years on the bench.