Ten random ideas that would improve current nation states:

1. The human rights are absolute and must never be violated: The universal declaration of human rights must be the basis of all laws and of all actions of the state and its citizens. These human rights must be legally binding, and any law that violates them to *any* extent must be null and void. All citizens must have the possibility to ask the courts to investigate violations of these fundamental rights; such investigations must be free of charge. Lawmakers found guilty to pass laws that violate or circumvent the basic human rights must be stripped of their position and put on trial as traitors.
2. Monarchy must be outlawed: There must be no monarchy or nobility, or their equivalent, nor any special rights for them. Constitutional monarchies must be dissolved and turned into true democracies. Democracy is the only acceptable form of government.
3. Bring back secularism: The state must be absolutely secular. Religion must be kept completely out of politics. This ban on religious involvement must be absolute: Prayers at school must be illegal just as it must be illegal for a president of member of parliament to swear an oath by the bible (or other religious book).
4. Stop special treatment for religions: All religious organizations must obey the same rules and laws as all other private organizations. Churches must pay the same taxes as corporations. Under no circumstance must a religious organization be exempt from any laws, regulations, taxes or fees that a non-religious organization must follow. Organizations that promote religion must never be considered as non-profit organizations. All religions must be equal before the state, and the state must not recognize, support, or validate any of them. Freedom of religion must never be valued higher than any other freedoms.
5. Politicians must never enjoy immunity: The people who make up “the state”, its organs, ministries, parliaments, and so on, must never, under any circumstance, be immune to any laws of the nation, nor from international law. All people are equal, and this includes politicians: If a politician commits a crime in his line of office, he must be held responsible.
6. All income of government official must be public: If a person works for the state in any capacity, this person’s sources of income must be known to an accountancy office, to the police, to the press, and to members of the public at any time for the rest of the person’s life as a guard against corruption. Employment contracts of government officials, members of parliament, and so on, must also always be public, even after their terms of office. Don’t like that? Don’t run for office.
7. Equalize taxation: Everybody must pay the same taxes, as measured as a percentage of their income (not profits). This includes all income from any source (labor, capital, gifts, inheritances). Corporations, organizations, and other legal entities must pay the same taxes as everybody else.
8. Stop state subsidies: The state must never gift money or other valuables to private corporations, institutions or individuals.
9. The state must not be in debt: The state must never, under any circumstances, spend more money than it takes in from taxation or other sources of income. The massive debts accumulated by current nations lead to huge interest payments, which causes problems for the state in the long run as a larger and larger percentage of taxation is used to pay those interests. If the state consistently takes in more than it spends, taxes must be lowered. Senselessly wasting tax money must be considered embezzlement/fraud.
10. Insecure voting must be outlawed: Election computers are easy to manipulate and must be outlawed. They can never be trusted to conduct elections. Elections are the basic foundation of a democracy; and they must be safeguarded against abuse. Paper is a tried and true method that is comparatively difficult to manipulate, and at any rate it is possible to verify the results of an election afterwards.

I know that some of these points are more practical than others, and it’s all terribly idealistic. I’ve wanted to include a “self defense” clause for the military, but I know that it’s easy to make any war look like self defense (cf. the War on Terror).

I also wanted to include an “absolute right to privacy”, but in the end I decided that the Human Rights cover that point: Instead, I decided that it would be better to have effective, easily-accessible methods of recourse for the citizens.

In the end, no set of laws will ever create a “perfect nation”. Utopia is impossible. What we really need are not only better laws; we need lawmakers with a conscience and with morals. They seem to be in very short supply these days.