Search on Find Policy delivers policy ideas and analysis by think tanks recognized for their research excellence and leadership, according to the following six criteria:

  1. professional recognition, as in regular mention in the media; think tank rankings (including GoTo Think Tank rankings by James McGann; public profile indexing, a method pioneered by Julia Clark and David Roodman); and finally, consultations with researchers in the policy field.  
  2. activity, typically with 10 to 15 pieces of relevant output per year.*
  3. minimum size, which in the US typically means an annual budget of $5m; ideas worth searching typically will be picked up by such institutions.* 
  4. independence, recognizing that independence can be a relative term in research.
  5. political diversity, with a distinct preference for evidence-based argument over partisan advocacy.
  6. freely accessible, i.e. not keeping results behind a pay wall.

We believe that the combination of these criteria will provide you with the best results when searching for policy analysis. For the US, we have a separate engine to search policy wonks, to add other perspectives and ideas. Note that we also have search pages focused on International Financial Institutions, or major consulting firms. Anything we can improve? Let us know! 

*For geographically focused searches, Find Policy relaxes the criteria for minimum size and number of publications, as there often are fewer institutions.