The Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC) of South Africa is a statutory body established in 1968. It supports development nationally, in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) and in Africa. It primarily conducts large-scale, policy-relevant, social-scientific projects for public-sector users, non-governmental organisations and international development agencies.

Over the last couple of years the HSRC underwent major restructuring, aligning its research activities and structures to South Africa's national development priorities: notably poverty reduction through economic development, skills enhancement, job creation, the elimination of discrimination and inequalities, and effective service delivery.

The HSRC also seeks to contribute to the research and development strategy of the HSRC's parent Department of Science and Technology, especially through its mission to focus on the contribution of science and technology to addressing poverty.

With its new structures and greatly extended research complement of more than 130 top researchers and 100 support staff in five different centres, the HSRC is well equipped to respond flexibly and comprehensively to these current and emerging needs. Its ten multi-disciplinary research programmes, focused on user needs, are spread across five centres in different parts of South Africa.

The HSRC strives to strike a balance between the undertaking of contract and commissioned research for users on the one hand, and of more fundamental enquiry on the other. It recognises that if its research is to make a significant difference to aspects of national life, it must be responsive to the needs of users and relevant to topical social issues, while at the same time advancing a theoretically informed understanding of society in all its aspects.

Within the framework of Metagora, the HSRC is implementing a pilot survey focusing on the realization of democracy and human rights in the context of South Africa's land reform process.