(There should be more future SE choises than i've included)
The advances you'd need to make that SE choise is in the parentheses.
Each choise would have advantages (+) and penalties (-). the penalties and advantages i've made are only suggestions, as i'm not at all sure of what they should be.
Main groups: Government type, centralism, economic model, religion, military and others.

Government type:
Despotism (default): The original form of government with you in complete charge.
-happiness (hap), trade, production (prod) and growth.
Examble: almost every ancient civ.

Direct democracy (democracy? - an antiquity advance): Every citizen has a vote, all citizens vote directly.
+hap
-prod (a lot) due to people having to spend a lot of time in politics and therefor not working. Maybe the advance internet would reduce this penalty a lot, because people could now vote from home.
Examble: the Greek city states.

Absolute monarchy (absolute monarchy?): the king is absolute, so the aristocracy have no power. Like despotism, but with less penalties, as the king (or whatever)'s son now enheritages his fathers position. It would also have a better bureaucratic system.
+war
Examble: several European states in the rennaissance, e.g. France.

Indirect democracy (modern democracy/liberalism?): the modern democracies. The people elect a parliament and a government to rule for them.
+trade, hap, growth
-war
Examble: most countries today.

Elite control (??): the civ is controlled by an elite, being a small percentage of the population. You would then have to choose which group to place your power on. The options should be something like: The military, the wealthy, the intelligentsia, the coorporations, the religion etc. Each would have bonuses and penalties. The group you based your power on would also have to be powerful, so if you based your power on the military you'd have to have a lot of units, if you based it on the religion (you could only base it on one religion) you'd need a lot of religious people, and if you based it on the wealthy there would have to be a strong upper class in your civ etc. You could base your power on several things, which would make the system more stable, but would also give you less bonuses and more penalties.
Examble: Most middle age countries in Europe, The Soviet Union, fascist Italy, Nazigermany. Also, when democracy first came, very few people could actually vote, so this would also be elite control (in USA in 1776 only 2% of the population could vote!!).

Virtual (real) democracy (virtual democracy): The future utopia, where everybody would have equal rights. Eliminates crime and corruption.

Centralization:

Central government (default): Good with small civs, but a lot of waste with large ones.
Examble: early civs, most small modern countries.

Citystate (citystate/republic): Each city is a province.
+trade and science
-growth

Feudalism (feudalism): The civ is divided into small provinces (representing the aristocrats, who each controlled their own area) of 1-5 cities each.
+growth
-trade and science.

Federation (federalism): The civ is divided into large provinces of max 20 cities each.
+prod.
Examble: most modern large countries, including germany, USA and Russia.

Economic model:
Self suppliance (default): People produce what they need. Generally bad, but the best choise if you have very little resources (like in the beginning or after a possible nuclear apocalypse)
-trade and science.
Examble: all early civs.

Citystate economics (city state/republic?): I'm not sure about this one, but there should be an economic system connected with the citystate. you would have to choose this to have the citystate.
+trade and science.

Feudalistic economics (feudalism): You would have to choose this to have feudalism.
-trade and science.
To make it worth wile having feudalism it would have to give some huge growth bonuses.

Mercantilism (mercantilism?): The economic system of the rennaissance. I don't know much about it, but it would generate more trade than the previous ones.

Laissez Faire/free market (liberalism): would generate much more trade than the previous ones, but with huge economic booms and crisis's. It would be a very uncertain economic system. Perhabs it wouldn't let the player decide what to build or what to research. (note: no country in the world uses this system today)
-hap due to poverty.

Communism (communism): Karl Marx's utopia. Would let everybody give as they could and recieve as they needed. Not much economic progress. It wouldn't let you trade with countries with another system. If the civ didn't have plenty of all raw materials needed the economy would totally collaps.
Huge hap and science bonuses.
(note: no country in the world has ever used this economic model).

Capitalism (capitalism/keynes's economics): Like liberalism, but the government now has some role in economics too. Some boom/crisis like in liberalism, but not so extreem. Would have several undergroups, from the laissez-faire capitalism of USA to the mixed economics of Skandinavia.
-hap due to poverty.

Socialism (socialism?): The system of Eastern Europe untill 1989. Would also contain undergroups, based on the level of unequality.

Coorporate republic (?): the whole civ will be dominated by a single coorporation who rules the civ.

Religion:
Each religion should be shown, along with the percentage of your people worshipping it (in your city management screens you could see these percentages for the individual city). There should be different types of religions: animalism, polytheism, mysticism, monotheism and atheism. I think a religion should be created every time a civ discoveres one of the those advances (animalism being ceremonial burial and atheism being evolutionary theory – of cause there should be only one type of atheism). A new religion should come in one of the cities in that civ, saying that some prophet has founded a new religion and creating a religious building in that city. The city should be randomly chosen and act as the ”capital” of the religion. The name of the religion could be chosen by you. Every religion should have ratings from 1 to 10 (being randomly chosen) in the fields of: how well it converts people and how well it gets people to continue beliveing. This would create a whole lot of religions, far more than there should be in the game. But most of these religions would have relatively low ratings, and would therefor never convert any people, or would at least die out pretty soon. Religions would only spread from a civ to another if the civs were in contact with each other. Trade routes would make them spread faster.
The religions should also add bonuses and penalties to their worshippers in fields like science, war, prod etc. You would be able to see all those numbers. With time the religion with the highest 1-10 numbers would convert everybody in the world.People could also join foreign religions. In general modern religions would have higher 1-10 numbers than ancient ones.
With all religions you could choose how your civ should react to them. There would be options like: forbid, tolerate, support and worship blind. This would to some point affect how the religions evolve in your civ. You would probably support one that gives you bonusses and also has high 1-10 numbers. You could only worship blind one religion, and then max tolerate the others. If you forbid a religion people of that faith would be unhappy, possibly revolt if they were the majority in some cities, or else emigrate to other civs, but with some time most of them would convert to another religion.
The religious leaders would have some power and could tell you what they wanted (like forbid other religions or conquor the city with the ”capital” of that religion). If you didn’t obey them they could make some unhappiness among its worshippers. If the majority of your population worshipped that religion they might make revolution or rebel, splitting your empire apart. But if you systematically kept working against the religion you could weaken its leaders with time (people would keep worshipping it, but wouldn’t be affected as much by what its leaders told them). You could even, somehow, make the religion your state religion (like the reformation) so you would be in total control of the religion.
Maybe the people could have different levels of worshipping a religion, ranging from very religious to almost not religious. People who weren’t very religious would not be affected very much by what the religion told them.

Military:
Conscription (conscription): Giving you as large an army as you had people, but would generate unhappiness.

Professional standing army (?): You couldn’t make as many units, but there would be no unhappiness.

Mercenaries?

I guess there should be more options here.

Others:
There should be other, more specific cases that you could either set for low, medium or high (like with enviromental protection) or on or offentlige (like with child labor). They could be changed pretty easy, and in a democracy people could perhabs change these by themselves.
Exambles:
Freedom of speech: High giving more hap and science, but would make unpopular decisions by you harder to make. Would also make it hard to have an undemocratic government if everything (economy, war etc.) didn’t go exceptionally well and vice versa.

Hard punishments:High would give less crime but unhappiness and vice versa.

Importance of nationalism: If high in a nation of one ethnic group would give bonuses, but in a civ with many nationalities it would make unhappiness and probable rebellions.

Militaristic fascination: (it’s a bad name, but it should be in the game) High would give you more units in a professional standing army but less science(?) and vice versa.

Enviromantal protection: High giving less pollution but less prod and vice versa.

Child labor: High giving higher prod but less science.

Free education: Would cost money but give more science and prod.

Foreign hospitality?

Hospitality for coorporations?

There should be several of these to make it work, letting you fine-adjust your empire (please come with suggestions). Some of these should occur after certain advances, like welfare state to make free education.

Thing to debate:
Should there be impossible combos or should certain combos just give penalties or be hard to keep (I favor the last one)?

SE changes shouldn’t occur as soon as you’d made them, but take some time, probably giving only penalties at first (representing the anarchy between governments). Major changes (like from absolute monarchy to democracy or from socialism to capitalism) should give major penalties leaving your empire crippled for a long time – up to 20 turns or so. You would then probably swich to something in between for a period.

Tribal - no modifier on happyness, disorder decreases over time, but increases when:
a new city is built
a forign city is conquered

Disorder will peak with the former, and then decrease, but with the latter will rise to a new minimum. If DISORDER rises to a significant level, anarky will erupt.

Dictatorship would be an option from the beginning.

Society: First of all society has to be stand alone. A lot of people have already talked about this so I'm not going to say to much about it. Society is influenced by a number of things which must be reflected in the game. Religion, environment, science, money, surroundings (including other societies), and yes government. Sometimes things are forced onto society and sometimes society changes itself. Governments have to reflect the society they govern or there will be trouble. The only way to govern a culture vastly different from that the government represents is through sheer force.

Government: This is the meat of my proposal. Government "types" are thrown out. Instead there needs to be a government "editor" of sorts. It might look something like this

1. Pick a governmental type: representative, monarchy (for lack of a better name for "rule by one".), and religious. These are the basic types of government. Underneath each of these is a subset of "laws" which you pick to really define your government. They all have consequences in how your government acts and whether the people will accept it or not. Changes in technology and society changes what is available on each government subset. The exact specifications of each "law" I don't care about as long as it reflects what is historically or actually possible. In this way every government type ever created can be generated by picking the "laws" that correspond. Ex. Communism could be created by picking representative type government and then choosing socialized industry and economics, one party rule, women's sufferage, ect. until you have classic Soviet rule.

I agree with you that the SE choises should reflect society, or there should be revolutions (you could supress the revolutions with force).

You have a point with your SE idea. But i still think you should decide what government there should be, the economic model used etc. In my post i have also included laws (like enviromental protection, child labour etc.) which i definately think should be included. But i just think they should be used to fine adjust your empire. the major choises should still be made like in SMAC, but with way more options (although i don't think there should be any "values" or "future society").

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I think you've hit the nail on the head with one important phrase. "More Options". What I was really saying is that governments, even those with the same "type", are not ever the same. All democracies are different as is each communist state. This really all I care about in the game is that your government reflects your society. AND, that you should not be able "Engineer" your society to whatever you want it to be except over an extended time period through slow changes in government policy. The exception of course would be revolution where people's sentiments can sway quickly to one side or another, usually only in very tough times.
Here's the kicker though that has never been given ample thought is that nearly all revolutions come from somewhere else than a people's revolt. Historically revolutions and coups de etat come from military leaders or upper middle class funding of military ventures. Until modern times the majority of the population only were concerned with whether they had food and a roof. Who governed them didn't matter so long as they didn't end up must worse than they already were (i.e. Dead). How this could be implemented though is a question I'm still pondering.

A note before I go on, I am of the opinion that each city should be taken as being composed of a single culture and religion. Dividing up a city into different cultures and religions adds a level of complexity that IMO does not add to game play. I also believe that government (organizational and economic) forms should actually CHANGE how we govern our civilizations and not be changes in name only.

Definitions:
Culture - the attitudes of militaristic, perfectionistic, etc, on a -10 to 10 scale instead of -1 to 1
Assimilation - the slow change of a conquered city's attitudes to match that of the empire's.
Discontent - a cumulative measure of the unhappiness of a city

I may need to add different definitions as I see people's comments.

There would be three parameters related to the governing of the civ:

Government Form - how I interact with my cities
Organizational Form - how I interact with the people
Economic Form - how I manage my economy

GOVERNMENT FORM: TRIBAL; MONARCHY; REPUBLIC; COMMUNIST; THEOCRACY; DEMOCRACY

TRIBAL - You are the Lord of your civilization and control:
diplomacy
military (restricted by Organizational Form)
direction of research
taxes
economics - all aspects
Organizational Forms: Restricted to Tribal only.
Economic Forms: Socialist
Benefits: little corruption when composed of one civilization;
Restrictions: finances are unsure, cities may withdraw money at will for their own projects;

MONARCHY - You are absolute ruler of your civilization and control:
diplomacy
military (may be restricted by Organizational Form)
direction of research
taxes (may be restricted by Organizational Form)
economic - all aspects (may be restricted by Economic Form)
Organizational Forms: all
Economic Forms: all
Benefits: increased cohesion of empire, compared to Tribal; central treasury
Restrictions: discontent may develop in conquered civilizations

REPUBLIC - You are Speaker of your civilization's Parliment and control:
diplomacy (Parliment must ratify treaties and declare wars)
military
direction of research (subject to Parliment's approval)
economic - with whom you trade (the rest may be restricted by Economic Form)
Parliment controls (but considers proposals by the Speaker):
taxes
Organizational Forms: Feudal, Provincial, City-state
Economic Forms: all
Benefits: central treasury; happiness +1; discontent slower to develop
Restrictions: loss of total control; discontent increases each time the Speaker acts as tie-breaker in a vote, goes down in majority votes

THEOCRACY - You are the religious head of your civilization and control:
diplomacy (may be restricted by Organizational Form)
military (may be restricted by Organizational Form)
direction of research
taxes (may be restricted by Organizational Form)
economy - all aspects (depending on economic form)
Organizational Forms: all
Economic Forms:all
Benefits: central treasury; corruption minimal in "loyal" cities; happiness +2 in all loyal cities;
Restrictions: You must choose a religion and that AI becomes your "parliment" if you choose the Centralized Organizational Form, otherwise only those cities with that particular religion are represented in parliment; parliment may usurp control of any area if it appears that you are not being true to the cause; happiness -2 in all "other" cities in your empire

DEMOCRACY - You are the President of your civilization and control:
diplomacy (Parliment must ratify treaties and declare wars)
military
Parliment controls (but considers Presidential proposals):
direction of research
taxes
economy - with whom your civ trades (the rest depends upon Economic Form)
Organizational Forms: PROVINCIAL; FEDERAL; FEUDAL; CITY-STATE; TRIBAL
Economic Forms:all
Benefits: central treasury; happiness +2; discontent slowest to develop
Restrictions: military actions that are not declared wars, will lower happiness temporarily

COMMUNIST - You are chairman of the communist assembly and you control:
diplomacy (assembly must ratify treaties)
military
direction of research
taxes
economy - restricted to neo-socialist
Organizational Forms: Feudal, Provincial, City-state
Benefits: If another communist country goes into REVOLT moving military units into that country, to quell the rebellion is allowed and not an act of war.
Restrictions: All food is distributed equally to each city w/waste and corruption level.

ORGANIZATIONAL FORM: CENTRALIZED; PROVINCIAL; FEDERAL; FEUDAL; CITY-STATE; TRIBAL

CENTRALIZED - No representation by the people.
Benefits: assimilation of conquered/absorbed peoples fastest; complete control of military; perceived strength in diplomacy +1;
Restrictions: corruption increased upon increasing distance from captial, but can be controlled with Governer' Residences;

PROVINCIAL - One representative per city a population over 10.
Benefits: all military subject to capital; happiness +1 in represented cities; corruption slope lower than in centralized form; corruption in non-represented cities depends upon distance to nearest represented city
Restrictions: discontent in unrepresented cities can turn into a full-blown civil war;

FEDERAL - Each population point has a representative in Parliment.
Benefits: no possiblility of city revolt during peace-time; corruption slope lower than Provincial
Restrictions: vulnerable to revolt from city discontent; city may hold militia separate from civ military;

FEUDAL - One representative in Parliment per city.
B: system very alluring to minor civs; corruption level in all cities (except the capital)
R: the autonomy (control of trade, production, military & payment of taxes) and assimiliation of each city depends upon the relative strength of the capital to each city; corruption moderate

CITY-STATE - One representative per population unit.
B: most alluring to minor or small civilizations; corruption low near the capital
R: as Leader of the civ, you may put items on the city's (other than the capital) production que, but the city governer can delay production indefinitly; assimilation stagnant; corruption starts going up after 10 squares (large map, Civ II) distance from capital;

TRIBAL - One representative per population unit.
Benefits: corruption low as long as the civ is homogeneous
Restrictions: cities past 5(civII large map) units distance from captial can be lost to independance; each city can declare war without Leader's approval even on another member city (loss of the capital costs the treasury, not actual loss of the city);

ECONOMIC FORM: SOCIALIST; FASCIST; KEYNES'; FREE MARKET

SOCIALIST - production and trade are controlled by the state, although corporations are allowed to exist

NEO-SOCIALIST - production and trade are controlled by the state, no corporations allowed to operate in civ

FASCIST - production is controlled by the state, but corporations can exist

KEYNES' - production and trade are monitored and only controlled by the state when nessesary

FREE MARKET - the government has no say in production or trade - all production is done by corporations

I don't know a lot about economics, so any suggestions here are welcome. I would suggest that we keep the 3 items of production per city and put in an algorithm to enable supply and demand.

Note: this idea is partially based upon the idea that if a civ is conquered it can attempt to found a Government in Exile in a friendly civ. The government in exile prevents the assimiliation of its former capital and lasts until all former cities have been assimiliated and the capital is razed.

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"The ability to speak does not make you intelligent."
-Qui-Gon Jinn

[This message has been edited by CormacMacArt (edited 07-20-1999).]

1) allow the president for democracy and republics to make suggestions to parliament, and the success of these would depend in part on the civ's happiness

2) there seems to be some mutually exclusive options between what is controled under certain governement types and certain economic types

3) I am not sure I understood the significance of the organizational form outside of what is covered in government type. I think this is a good initial concept but needs to be more distinct

how do I relate to the cultures in my civ
how do I relate to the cities
how do I deal with economic issues

My proposal attempts to deal with that. Thus there is a difference between a Centralized Monarchy (the goal of every king) and a Feudal Monarchy. Looking at my proposal, you can see that England progressed from a Feudal Monarchy to a Federal Monarchy, ultimatly ending up at Centralized Republic.