Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences (FASS)

At the first meeting of the Senate of the University of Sydney on the 3 February 1851, it was decided to proceed with the foundation of a college as a first step towards establishing a university and agreed to rent Sydney College for 2 years. It also adopted the report of a committee established to suggest the way in which the proposed college should be set up. The committee recommended a plan where the Faculty of Arts was given the preference of first selection, "not because other branches of knowledge are undervalued or considered to be unimportant in education, but because it appears to form the foundation of any complete system."

To begin with, instruction was to be restricted to Greek and Latin (along with Greek and Roman history), mathematics (pure and mixed), and chemistry and experimental philosophy. One professor was to be appointed in each field with the classical professor as principal of the college. Degrees were to be restricted to Arts. With the exception of the requirement of Chemistry in the BA, instruction was to be narrowly classical (including logic and moral philosophy) and mathematical, as it was in Oxford and Cambridge.

At the inauguration of the University on 11 October 1852 Sir Charles Nicholson included in address a reference to the foundation professors as being the "faculty of arts." However, it is not until the By-Laws passed by Senate on 10 December 1855 and approved by the Governor and executive Council on 30 January 1856 that the Faculty's existence was formally established.

On 3 November 1919 the Senate adopted a report of the committee it appointed to consider the Professorial Board's recommendations on the academic structure of the University. This included the creation of six new faculties. New By-Laws and Regulations were adopted. This restructure of the academic structure also brought structural changes within individual faculties. New regulations covering the disciplines, published in the 1922 Calendar, show a new school structure of the Faculty which included the School of Classical Philology and Ancient History, School of English Language and Literature, School of Mathematics and Natural Philosophy, School of Logic, Mental, Moral and Political Philosophy, School of French and German, School of History.

By 1927 the schools of Economics and Anthropology had been added.

Following the University's Strategic Plan 2011–2015 on January 1, 2011 the Faculty of Arts became the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, incorporating the Discipline of Economics as a new School of the faculty, along with the Centre for International Security Studies (CISS) and the Graduate School of Government (GSG) which were transferred to the faculty from the Faculty of Economics and Business. [Senate res. 235/10 of 6 Dec 2010] SENATE RESOLUTION SEN_7/15_98

In December 2015 Senate endorsed SEG's agreed proposal to reduce the number of faculties from 16 to six.

From January 1, 2017, the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences was to include the Faculty of Education and Social Work and Sydney College of the Arts. New committee structure requirements for faculty and University schools came into effect from 1 January 2021.