RICSA's mission has always involved relating research to the transformation of South African society. At its inception, RICSA sought to tell the story of South African Christianity historically providing a point or points of orientation for Christianity in transition. Its hope was expressed as telling this story in such a way as to re-present what hitherto had been seen as "the victims of history" as its agents. The Social History Project has been active throughout the decade collecting documents and contributing to this transformative understanding of Christianity in South African history.

As the transformation process in South Africa gained momentum, RICSA began to accumulate projects throughout the first half of the 1990s, including economic justice, values, Christianity and Democracy, and environmental issues. Some of these projects were commissioned by the World Council of Churches and others, including Theology of Life and theological education projects..

South African society has been in a state of transition since 1990. Likewise RICSA has evolved as an institution during this period. It joined with the Institute for Comparative Religion in Southern Africa to form the Religion and Social Change Unit in 1993. This has provided opportunity for crossfertilization with ICRSA -- like RICSA a research institute, but not one informed by a particular interest in Christianity. RICSA sought to integrate its particular institutional shape with the various special research interests of Christian Studies students in UCT's Department of Religious Studies. This had the effect of making RICSA a capacity-building institute (developing researchers for the future).

But this also created a problem: with so many projects underway, RICSA risked becoming merely the sum of its individual parts. In 1996, Professor Duncan Forrester of Edinburgh University performed an evaluation of RESCU and RICSA, suggesting, that points of coherence be identified among RICSA's many projects, to guide in the selection of future projects.

RICSA grew further when James Cochrane arrived from the University of Natal in 1997, bringing a strong interest in theology and public life which climaxed in an international conference, the Multi-Event 1999, held in February 1999. Cochrane also created a discussion about the structure of RICSA, in accordance with the concerns expressed by Forrester. As RICSA began to seriously reflect on its structures, particularly with reference to their relation to its stated aim of promoting liberatory research, RICSA's research areas expanded considerably. Higher profile research began to be commissioned, including research into the way Christianity was being represented in the South African Parliament. Later in 1997, RICSA was approached by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission to write a report on the Faith Community hearings, to be conducted in November that year. This particular research served to bring together the social history and public life foci, particularly as shaped by the imperatives of transformation and Christianity's changing role therein.

As RICSA's projects consolidated, reflection on the transformation of Christianity itself became a more concern. This was particularly so with reference to the question of Africanisation, as exemplified in RICSA's 1995 School of Theology and the 1997 25th Anniversary celebration of the Journal of Theology for Southern Africa, which focussed on Christianity and Africanisation. The Africanisation research area was launched early in 1998, and continues with fieldwork in Guguletu. While a specific research area, like social history and public life, it touches all other areas of RICSA's research. Most recently, a fourth research area has been launched, concerned with arts and transformation.

In the meantime, RICSA's maturity as an institution continues. Early in 1999, Bastienne Klein initiated a process of reflecting on RICSA's vision, mission and aims. This culminated in the formation of a statement, which is available on this web site. The process also helped rationalise RICSA's research areas, especially in terms of the contribution RICSA could make alongside, rather than in competition with, like-minded institutions.

RICSA has grown much from its origins as a history project. It has been shaped by its changing context, not only the national and political, but also the academic contexts are different from the start of the decade. As South Africa matures in its democracy, so RICSA's particular contribution to that democracy will become clearer.