Even in Kirk's day StarFleet described itself as having primarily an exploratory and scientific mission, and everyone was obliged to be offended when anyone suggested differently. Other species had military fleets to the degree they were warlike, near 100% for the Klingons and Romulans. I don't recall any mention of a Vulcan warship.

I was watching an old DS9 last night and thought of you when Quark started bitching about the decline of Ferengi values (scandalized by a minimum wage, retirement plans, etc.) and pined for the good old days of dog-eat-dog laissez faire capitalism. That was a bit over the top, and except for the Ferengis I don't think Star Trek's treatment of free enterprise and capitalism have been all that harsh. Seems to me more like an implication that they've advanced beyond all that, in an era of such abundance that the old mechanisms of competition and profit are irrelevant. There was the scene in First Contact in which Picard is asked what the Enterprise cost, and he couldn't come up with an explanation that would make sense to somebody from the 21st Century, and he finally said, "uh, we do things a bit differently in the 24th century".

It ocurred to me the other day that there's an interesting intersection out in the future between the endpoint of Marxism and the endpoint of today's advocates of space development: Abundance. In Marx's vision, someday manufacturing would be so automated and efficient that everyone could devote themselves to personal fulfillment and have all their material needs met by the system. In the space development view someday resources harvested from the Solar System, plus unlimited energy captured from the Sun, would make us all wealthy beyond the dreams of Midas, awash in everything material. Nanotechnology has been promoted with the same utopian vision.

So maybe the Federation is simply the generic realization of a whole lot of utopian visions?

"Enterprise" has touched on trade a bit; so did TOS--remember Harry Mudd? Even more interesting is the implication in "Enterprise" that prior to development of "fast" warp-4 ships, there had been a culture of traders who formed long-term communities on slow trading vessels, traveling perhaps warp 1 or 2 and spending years between stars. Seems like that would be fertile ground for another series. I have to say I've been disappointed with "Enterprise" simply because it isn't different enough--or maybe I should say primitive enough--compared to the later universe. They still make it look too easy.

I read "Citizen of the Galaxy", and don't remember it as a trade story. Wasn't it about a young boy kidnapped and made a slave, who later finds out he's royalty?