The politics can't really be addressed by software, true. However, much of development is actually process and project management with complicated non-intuitive workflows. I think there's potential for software to help. do something like - for a given municipality, what size building can I build under a specific set of planning assumptions, and what is the process for obtaining the necessary permits and approvals to build that building?

In healthcare I imagine that they are at least somewhat universal across an industry or sub field or country. At the very least insurance forces some standardization.

A town of 10K might have a completely separate building code and zoning categories.