It's not that I don't think this type of society would be a good one to live in if it could be pulled off, but I don't see northern Europe as a realistic example. As much as I admire them, these are sparsely populated, somewhat xenophobic societies. IMO, the Selfish Gene idea was a mistake. Evolution doesn't choose to preserve any component of an organism, not the genes, not even the organism itself. Gene's evolve and are lost whereby the organism carries on, and organisms are lost whereby the gene carries on. It is an arbitrary perspective, nothing more. There is no preservation, only change. Similarly, a CEO can be seen as valuable or doing nothing useful at all, depending on different valid perspectives. There is no greater social victory in becoming a CEO. It can be a personal one, but someone will inevitably be the CEO. IMO, I think we are talking about a society that feels better to live in. To that end, I think we should start with the obvious broken parts, and work from there. We need to find where people are killing each other, and find solutions that work for them. Solutions they own. Find people that are starving, and find solutions that work for them. Solutions they own. Each solution should be implemented in the current framework, which will lead to gradual changes of the framework. Practical problem-solving. We should crowd-source this problem solving as much as possible. Make it easy for people to contribute. We need to grow a positive-acting society from a sapling. We can't determine the formula for success. It's not possible. But people rise to the occasion when they are given the means. It's like an altruistic pressure that can be released.
To be honest, with this article I felt half like he was making interesting points and half like he was saying nothing new. Providing people their basic needs is probably the only real point of contention people would have with what he says - the article doesn't really get very specific. I suppose I should read the book at some point. I just remembered hearing about bread riots in France. How shopkeepers were targeted - because they were making a profit off of people's hunger, which was morally outrageous at a fundamental level. As if it was just wrong to charge high prices for such a basic item as bread that so many depend on.