Policy for the People (P4P)

Policy for the People (P4P), built by Georgetown University’s Massive Data Institute, combines legal expertise with the power of AI to help citizens and local government agencies discover and navigate complex state and federal laws.

Ask Questions. Get Answers.

Use Policy for the People to demystify government policy with fast, fact-based responses to plain-language questions:

• Discover applicable laws, regulations and executive orders
• Understand how different laws interact
• Assess how local policy decisions meet the law
• Navigate policy decisions based on existing laws

Get Started

How It Works

Built on a sophisticated legal framework, Policy for the People provides quick access to laws and regulations along with simple explanations to guide government agency decisions and help citizens understand how policies affect them. It pulls directly from United States Code so the information is always up to date and it has built-in guardrails that keep searches confidential and secure.

Bring Policy for the People to Your Community

At MDI, we partner with state and local government agencies to customize Policy for the People, pulling in your statutory corpus to help citizens and agency staff quickly and accurately find relevant statutes and shape better decisions based on law. Contact us to learn more: p4p@georgetown.edu

Policy for the People In Action

Government agencies, public sector practitioners, researchers and citizens rely on Policy to the People.

Association of Public Data Users (APDU)

Providing APDU members with a tool to more quickly research data collection and sharing legal complexities, and tie their data policy determinations to authoritative sources of guidance.

Public Interest Privacy Center (PIPC)

Ensuring trustworthy interpretation of Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) by incorporating guidance documents issued by the Student Privacy Policy Office at the Department of Education.

Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board

Exploring how to incorporate State and Local statute into Policy for the People to help their local education agencies navigate existing federal and state laws.

Meet the Team

Policy for the People is built by legal, tech and policy experts from Georgetown University’s Massive Data Institute at the McCourt School of Public Policy and the Georgetown University Law Center. 

Leadership

Jake Pasner, Assistant Research Professor, Team Lead

Sejin Paik, Assistant Research Professor, Co-Lead 

Team Members

Brandon Waldon, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor
University of South Carolina

Elizabeth Atori
Research Fellow
LL.M. student in Technology Law & Policy, Georgetown University

Kang (Kangheng) Liu
Research Fellow
MS in Data Science and Analytics, Georgetown University

Technical support provided by Knexus.

Policy for the People is supported by the Gates Foundation.