The Sub-Commission each year adopts its agenda on the first day of the session. The order of items may change in the final version. Typically item 1 is completed on the first day; item 2 during the first week; items 3 through 6 are considered during the 2nd week and the beginning of the 3rd week; and item 7 is heard at the end of the 3rd week.
The precise schedule is difficult to predict, since deliberations tend to run behind schedule. A rough workplan of which agenda item which will be considered on each day is usually issued by the Bureau of the Sub-Commission after the first day. The order of items below is the official list used for reference purposes from year to year, so that documents and other materials can be keyed numerically to the right agenda item before being filed. However, last year the Sub-Commission announced it would consider reordering the items this year so that item 6, specific human rights issues, would be moved up to be heard immediately after item 2.
1. Organization of work
2. Question of the violation of human rights and fundamental freedoms, including policies of racial discrimination and segregation, in all countries, with particular reference to colonial and other dependent countries and territories: report of the Sub-Commission under Commission on Human Rights resolution 8 (XXIII) [Note: this item is also commonly referred to as "country situations"]
3. Administration of justice, rule of law and democracy
4. Economic, social and cultural rights
5. Prevention of discrimination:
a. Racism, racial discrimination and xenophobia;
b. Prevention of discrimination and protection of indigenous eoples;
c. Prevention of discrimnation and protection of minorities
6. Specific human rights issues:
a. Women and human rights;
b. Contemporary forms of slavery;
c. New priorities, in particular terrorism.
7. Draft provisional agenda and adoption of the report:
a. Draft provisional agenda for the fifty-sixth session of the Sub-Commission;
b. Adoption of the report on the fifty-fifth session.