The Legal Priorities Project is an independent, global research project founded by researchers from Harvard University. We conduct legal research that tackles the world’s most pressing problems – we call this “legal priorities research.”
More about us
We aim to establish “legal priorities research” as a new research field. We currently focus on four cause areas: law and governance of advanced artificial intelligence, synthetic biology, institutional design, and meta-research. Our research is influenced by the principles of effective altruism and the longtermism paradigm.
More about our researchThe agenda is divided into three parts. In the first part, we argue that cause prioritization in legal research is both important and neglected, provide an overview of our philosophical foundations, and describe our methodological approach. In the second part, we present our current focus areas (namely, artificial intelligence, synthetic biology, institutional design, and meta-research), identify promising research projects, and provide an overview of relevant literature. In the final part, we discuss two cause areas for further engagement (namely, space governance and animal law).
Download our research agenda
The Legal Priorities Lab is a series of informal, weekly online meetings where we discuss ongoing research of our members and invited academics. The 1-hour sessions are open to the public (with few exceptions). They take place every Friday at 5:00 PM (GMT) unless otherwise specified. You can find all details on our Events page. We look forward to seeing you!
See upcoming events and registerIf you are interested in our work, subscribe to our newsletter! Roughly once a month, you will receive a short email with our latest publications, open positions, and upcoming events.
