Public read-only API for SA Policy Space data
SA Policy Space exposes a JSON API for researchers, developers, and policy tools. All endpoints are read-only and publicly accessible — no API key required. The versioned /api/v1/ endpoints carry a stability guarantee; the unversioned endpoints are stable but unversioned.
Constraint filters use canonical database names in responses, but the ideas listing endpoint also normalizes a small set of common aliases in requests to make query construction easier.
OpenAPI 3.0 specification (JSON)
https://sa-policy-space.vercel.appThese endpoints follow semver-style versioning. Breaking changes will increment the version prefix.
List policy ideas with optional filtering and sorting. Search covers title, description, theme, source committee, and responsible department.
searchconstraintstatuspackagetimeHorizonsortcurl "https://sa-policy-space.vercel.app/api/v1/ideas?constraint=energy&status=implemented"{
"version": "1",
"data": [
{
"id": 42,
"title": "Electricity Regulation Amendment Act — Competitive Electricity Market",
"binding_constraint": "energy",
"current_status": "implemented",
"growth_impact_rating": 5,
"feasibility_rating": 4,
"reform_package": 1,
"time_horizon": "medium_term",
"source_committee": "Mineral Resources and Energy",
"slug": "electricity-regulation-amendment-act"
}
],
"meta": {
"count": 123
}
}Stable but without formal versioning guarantees. Used by the SA Policy Space application itself.
/api/ideasIdeas — unversioned (stable, no breaking changes planned)/api/packagesPackages — unversioned/api/statsStats — unversioned/api/themesConstraint summaries — unversioned/api/dependency-graphD3 dependency graph dataCurrently: No rate limits. The API is open and free for research use.
Planned: API key authentication and per-key rate limits will be introduced in a future version to support higher-traffic use cases. Keys will be issued free of charge for academic and policy research.
Policy idea data is synthesised from South African parliamentary committee proceedings sourced via the Parliamentary Monitoring Group (PMG). Ideas represent original editorial synthesis — not PMG verbatim text. If you use this data in research or publications, please cite SA Policy Space and PMG as the original source of meeting records.