Mandisa Lusanda Shandu

Mandisa Lusanda Shandu is a South African attorney currently pursuing a DPhil in Law at the University of Oxford.

Mandisa’s research interrogates the function of property law in the context of deepening racial, gendered, spatial and economic inequality, and focuses on land redistribution as a prerequisite for justice and freedom.

As a lawyer, she has been involved in public interest litigation cases relating to constitutional, property, spatial planning, housing, and human rights law, administrative justice, and access to basic services. She is especially interested in innovative and multi-pronged strategies to advocate for long-term structural change. She has collaborated in these efforts with activists and social movements, economists, politicians, policymakers, creatives, artists, academics, and urban planning and design practitioners.

Previously, Mandisa practised as an attorney and served as executive director at Ndifuna Ukwazi (NU), a Cape Town-based nongovernmental organisation and pro bono law centre working to advance human rights and social justice, with a focus on access to land and affordable, dignified housing. Before serving as executive director, she founded and led NU’s Law Centre, becoming the first Black woman to establish a public interest litigation unit in South Africa.

Mandisa has a master’s degree in Constitutional and Administrative Law (with distinction), and an LLB and Bachelor of Social Sciences from the University of Cape Town. She currently sits on the boards of the Land and Accountability Research Centre, the Socio-Economic Rights Institute and the Social Change Assistance Trust.

She has held various positions at the University Oxford, including Chairperson of Oxford Pro Bono Publico, Editor at the Oxford Human Rights Hub, the Deputy President of the Oxford Law Black Alumni Network and Co-Convenor of the Decolonising the Law Discussion Group.'