If I ruled the world:
I’d have a reputation based currency where prosocial actions that benefit a community’s interests raise an individual’s reputation with that group. People can raise their own reputation by doing favours for reputable individuals and organisations in line with the values of those entities. This would take the place of both commerce and politics and merge the two into a single system of reciprocity. People who build roads, for example, would gain positive regard from motorists and could expect a certain degree of reciprocal benefits from anybody who owns a car.
Prisons would be replaced with education facilities with practical courses on managing lifestyles without impacting on the rights of others. Basically, instead of telling criminals that they are Bad, tell them that they are simply at a lower level of development and help them to grow to a place where they can function within society.
The education system itself would also become less prison-like, with a focus on multiple intelligences (rather than Maths and English) and a framework and a goal of developing existing gifts to a level of specialisation and also raising areas of weakness to levels where they can adequately support areas of gifting. School grades and subject access would end up looking more like a computer game skill tree as competency in one subject opens new options for study and development.
Pain, sorrow, anger and all the other “negative” emotions would still exist, but society would learn to see them as equally beneficial and positive contributors to healthy lifestyle. Consideration of the shadow self would be normalised through movies and television shows sponsored by the People’s Republic of Jamin. Fear of the “other” would gradually be broken down. Racial differences, sexual differences, cultural and religious differences would all be accepted and embraced, while still being measured for values alignment.
All babies born in hospitals would be sterilised at birth in a procedure which could be reversed in later life after the individual has been means tested, childcare trained and obtained a parenting licence.
Mining of non-renewable resources would be capped at the current rate and mining companies would use free market economics to determine who could mine what and in what quantities. Any group or individual using technology which creates changes in the natural environment would be required to take responsibility for mitigating any damage caused at their own expense. Electricity prices would probably be temporarily inflated, causing research into genuine renewables to become commercially viable.
So… who is voting for me as global dictator?
Church of Jaminology 
you had me till forced sterilisation and parenting license.
The rest looks good, but I am ideologically opposed to that at the highest level.
If the rest of your system cant be self-supporting without this cludge, then you have problems with the rest of the system. Or not thought it out sufficiently.
The reputation based currency/poilitics reminds me greatly of a great short that I recently re-read:
And Then There Were None
http://www.abelard.org/e-f-russell.php
(in fact, I recently read http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Explosion – which was the novel adapted from it)
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Yeah. I’ve been contemplating a lot of the logistical problems of who gets to decide if somebody is fit to become a parent and the massive potential for exploitation. I think my main motivation behind this one is that I’d like parenthood to be an “opt in” rather than an “opt out” position. Theoretically it is in the sense of people being able to choose to have sex or not, but I don’t think that is what people are really planning when they’ve had a few drinks and decide to hook up with a random at the bar.
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if it was purely “opt-in”, without any other requirements, then I think that would be OK… except that then the whole thing is still too easily the thin end of the wedge for latter “additional requirements” to add in.
“well, opt-in once you’re of childbearing age only, of course. so 16+”
…
“make that 18+”
…
“make that after a basic means test to show you can afford to raise the kid”
…
“make that after a basic literacy test to show you can teach the kid a bit”
…
…
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“make that after a full genetic examination of yourself and the other parent, and you rank in the 20th percentile of literacy and/or means testing, along with a 90%+ chance of no birth defects, etc”
so while “opt-in” by itself with nothing else sounds acceptable, it’s still a slippery wedge, so I’d have to still say I’m against it.
on this front, I stand quite firmly on a pure ‘let biology take its course’ front. I’ve never seen any other stance that isn’t either outright scary, or an obvious path to the same
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I’m generally against mass medication of healthy people (eg toxic waste in the water supply to make people’s teeth whiter) but I am also scared of uncontrolled population growth, particularly when a large portion of the children born are unwanted or accidental.
Perhaps something in the water supply that could be easily filtered? We are already building up a lot of oestrogen…
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The rest of your ideas seem to be encouraging an educated, responsible society.
I’m pretty sure that that is enough. (rather, my argument is that it damn well should be enough! 🙂
(the rate of natural increase is already negative in a number of countries, though to be fair, a number of those are due to wars and economic strifes. Japan is a notable exception there.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_natural_increase
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