How Today's Technology Is Rapidly Catching Up to Star Trek. Why Speculative Fiction has a lot to offer us.

I would recommend The Truth Machine by James L Halperin for starters.

http://www.amazon.com/Truth-Machine-James-Halperin-ebook/dp/B000FC1KR0/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1404345345&sr=8-1&keywords=the+truth+machine

It reads like a blueprint to create software to change the world. It spans a lot of creative thought and careful planning. It is pretty inspiring as well.

"What would the world be like if scientists developed the perfect lie detector? How would it change our criminal justice system? Psychiatric practice? International diplomacy? In his first novel, Halperin argues that such an invention could lead humanity into an era of unequaled prosperity, one in which crime is virtually unknown and true democracy is possible. A professional numismatist and a member of the World Future Society, Halperin is a relatively unskilled novelist. His prose is at best workmanlike, and his plotting and character development tend toward the simplistic. Nearly all of his major characters, from millionaire-genius protagonist Pete Armstrong on down, seem to be either the smartest, the richest, the most respected or the most influential people in the world. The traditional qualities of fiction are apparently of only secondary interest to the author, however. As a futurist, Halperin seems primarily concerned with suggesting innovations and then working out their implications over half a century. Heavily didactic, but supporting positions across the political spectrum, the book argues in favor of mandatory capital punishment for certain crimes, the privatization of schools, strict limits on insurance settlements, the elimination of the FAA, the legalization of assisted suicide, parental licensing and the establishment of a world government. Although crude from a literary point of view, Halperin's novel is not without strengths. His speculations about the next 50 years are fascinating, and the consequences of the truth machine are well worked out. In the final analysis, it's hard to believe that Halperin's near-utopian future could be so easily attained, but it would be nice to live there"

I don't agree with all the ideas here, some of them are presented as cautionary tales, but the point is to get thinking in the right direction. It is truly visionary and speculative work.

Last semester I actually took a class where this is what we actually did. Dune was one of the books we read, and I agree that it would fit into it excellently.

Halting State has some interesting insight into virtual economies, surveillance states, and online-terrorism. I think some of the later Ender's Game books revolving around inter-planetary communication and politics in an absence of FTL travel are relevant. The Culture novels provide some insight into dealing with a post-scarcity society and how we'd set that up.

A lot of science fiction is incredibly farfetched, so I think to look for perfect analogs to the real world is unadvised in a lot of cases. Instead, it's the ideas and premises that are important. Issues like government structure, surveillance, morality, education, etc...