Would it even be worth it to try policing superheroes?

[biostem]

Let's say we lived in a universe where superheroes/supervillains, and superpowers are a reality. Next, assume that these abilities range from the fairly mundane to the extraordinary. Assuming that the people with these abilities occur randomly and across all races/ethnicities and places across the planet, and that some keep their powers secret, some use their powers for good, and others use their powers for evil, would it make sense to devote significant resources toward trying to forcibly register and police such people?

[Ralin]

Register, probably not. Maintain detailed records on their powers, histories and personalities, absolutely. Having contingency plans for a rampage by the Hulk may not let you stop him, but it's better than not preparing at all. Active is better than passive.

[biostem]

Register, probably not. Maintain detailed records on their powers, histories and personalities, absolutely. Having contingency plans for a rampage by the Hulk may not let you stop him, but it's better than not preparing at all. Active is better than passive.

I suppose I should clarify that I mean trying to regulate superhumans *before* they actually do anything. Sure, taking proactive measures to minimize any damage done by such individuals and/or having response plans/personnel in place would make sense, but I was more interested in what to do with these people beforehand.

[The Romulan Republic]

Ultimately, you either stick with "All men are created equal", or you start preemptively punishing and restricting people, which is just going to erode Democracy and the rule of law and piss of a bunch of people with super powers.

Depending on the nature of their powers, it might sometimes be necessary to isolate someone who was a threat (a mild/borderline case of this is Rogue's life sucking by physical contact in X-Men). Beyond that, though, innocent until proven guilty and all.

But you would obviously need means to deal with super human enemies/criminals. Possibly that could be done simply with existing weaponry, or by building new weapons. For a Superman-level threat, though, you're going to have to recruit comparably powerful superhumans into government service. Perhaps provide incentives for superhumans to sign on with the military or law enforcement.

[FaxModem1]

How extraordinary is extraordinary? Are we talking something like Heroes, in which the abilities might be something that could alter lives, but they're mostly capable of being stopped by a bullet, Marvel, in which they're capable of feats humans aren't, or DC, in which they could change the world by the hour if they wanted to?

[biostem]

How extraordinary is extraordinary? Are we talking something like Heroes, in which the abilities might be something that could alter lives, but they're mostly capable of being stopped by a bullet, Marvel, in which they're capable of feats humans aren't, or DC, in which they could change the world by the hour if they wanted to?

I kind of left that vague... let's assume not quite Superman levels, but up there with Hulk or Magneto.

[Tribble]

I kind of left that vague... let's assume not quite Superman levels, but up there with Hulk or Magneto.

Erm, what kind of Magneto-type level? The movie kind, where he is only able to manipulate metal?

Or the comic book kind, where in addition to manipulating metal he can fly, generate energy beams / EMP pulses , generate force fields able to withstand nukes and allowing him to survive in space, can generate wormholes for teleportation, can use atral projection, has pretty much total control of the EM spectrum and can strip the Earth of its Magnetic field, can manipulate gravity to a degree, can kill people just by shutting down their brain chemistry, is highly resistant to telepathy without needing the helmet (to the point where Emma frost can't read his mind while standing right next to him), can manipulate Earth's magnetic field to supress the telepathic abilities of others, including Professor X... Oh, and he's a genius with great knowledge in areas such as military tactics, engineering, biology and physics. And has reflexes over 15x faster than a regular person. Is that the Magneto type character your talking about?


If it's the former there may be ways of dealing with those characters, if it's the ladder... well, I don't see what we can do, apart from hoping that they don't snap and go on a genocidal rampage, and that they will eventually die of old age

[The Romulan Republic]

Simple. You need superheros on the side of the law to counter the Magnetos of the world. Ideally they'd be under the authority of the government and the law rather than vigilantes. I'm sure you can get some super powered soldiers and cops who take their oaths seriously.

[Ralin]

Trying to forcibly register people with superpowers as a precaution is just going to piss them off and create a self-fulfilling prophecy if it's anything more intrusive than, "Hey, cool trick. Would you like a sweet job churning out lightning bolts for the power company? You'll get full health insurance with no copay and everything so long as you sign on the dotted line here."

Now, if people are literally -trying- to be superheroes then they're probably breaking some sort of laws, but then we're past the point of preemptive registration.

[Soontir C'boath]

Frankly, I'd start to worry about other things like building codes.

[LastShadow]

Lets be honest, the best out come they could hope for is a sense of accountability for super powered people. Maybe forming a special division of powered folk, one with funding and oversight.

But lets be real honest, for the most part if someone with powerful enough powers objects, there really isn't much anyone could do, bBUT some equally powerful or more powerful being could interject and force the issue.
It all depends on if you can get the most powerful folk on your side first.

[Simon_Jester]

Let's say we lived in a universe where superheroes/supervillains, and superpowers are a reality. Next, assume that these abilities range from the fairly mundane to the extraordinary. Assuming that the people with these abilities occur randomly and across all races/ethnicities and places across the planet, and that some keep their powers secret, some use their powers for good, and others use their powers for evil, would it make sense to devote significant resources toward trying to forcibly register and police such people?

Honestly, realistically? Yes, for a number of reasons:

1) There are a wide variety of known superpowers which present extreme opportunities for the commission of crimes, including otherwise 'undetectable' crimes, such as invisibility, telekinesis, shapeshifting, mind control, and so on. Especially in a quasi-realistic setting where people use these powers intelligently and don't always wear brightly colored costumes, this poses a major threat to public order. And it would be impossible to police, respond to, or in some cases even detect such crimes without knowing who is capable of them. Having a list of all the invisible men in Chicago is a reasonable precaution for the Chicago police, in case an invisible purse snatcher starts committing robberies.

2) There is a wide gap between the level of the typical amateur superhero vigilante and a trained fighting force. Having large numbers of super-vigilantes (including people who grossly overestimate the value of their powers and get into situations they can't handle) poses a lot of threat to innocent bystanders, and to themselves. People who are going to go out on the streets and "fight crime" should at a MINIMUM have the same level of training as real police officers.

Given how many random unarmed black men get killed by cops, probably more training than the cops do in the US. Paranoid vigilantes with the power to casually demolish anyone they think is suspicious are not such a great thing. I mean, do we really want a reprise of the Trayvon Martin case, only instead of the killing instrument being George Zimmerman's automatic, it's the metasonic blast of the Masked Discombobulator?

3) In times of crisis, super-powered individuals are a major potential national asset and it may be necessary to mobilize their talents in an orderly manner. Just as we have Selective Service registration set up in case we ever need to reinstate the draft, it is reasonable to have lists of who can and cannot bench-press a mobile home or shoot lasers from their ears.

4) An organized national registry of who has what superpowers, with some kind of system for assuring they are trained with them, is also an economic asset (some superpowers are marketable abilities you can use to make money... IF there is anyone in a position to certify your powers are safe and stable).

And that's just off the top of my head.

...

Now, a sensible law involving superhero registration would look very different from how it was handled in Marvel. Among the key points:

1) Since superpowers sometimes come about as an accident or have a sudden onset, there should be a reasonable 'grace period' built into the law.

2) Secrecy and privacy should be reasonably assured- this could be difficult to arrange.

3) Policing needs to be handled separately by at least two, probably three, distinct agencies, and that's not counting bad guys best taken care of by mundane means (e.g. the Joker is a problem for a very good SWAT team, and Lex Luthor is a problem for the SEC). Off the top of my head...
3a) A superhuman military or paramilitary body that tackles foreign or alien superhuman threats (e.g. alien invasions, gods, etc.)
3b) A policing agency responsible for 'low level' super-crime, relatively mundane stuff with minimal collateral damage, but with enough paranormal aspects that normal mundane cops aren't equipped to cope.
3c) There might need to be a third group responsible for dealing with high collateral damage threats native to the US (e.g. the Hulk).

4) It would be absurd to require all super-powerful people to train for combat or anything like that. Such training would only be require of people who seriously intend to run around fighting.

[Zeropoint]

And it would be impossible to police, respond to, or in some cases even detect such crimes without knowing who is capable of them. Having a list of all the invisible men in Chicago is a reasonable precaution for the Chicago police, in case an invisible purse snatcher starts committing robberies.

How are you going to force the invisible purse snatcher to confess his or her invisibility powers ahead of time? Wouldn't "failure to register superpowers" just be another charge you could throw at the perp AFTER you catch them?

[Lonestar]

I kind of left that vague... let's assume not quite Superman levels, but up there with Hulk or Magneto.

The Hulk has gone toe-to-toe with Supes before, and has literally dug down to the core of a planet and held it together. He is Superman-tier, especially when he's really pissed off.

[The Romulan Republic]

Let's say we lived in a universe where superheroes/supervillains, and superpowers are a reality. Next, assume that these abilities range from the fairly mundane to the extraordinary. Assuming that the people with these abilities occur randomly and across all races/ethnicities and places across the planet, and that some keep their powers secret, some use their powers for good, and others use their powers for evil, would it make sense to devote significant resources toward trying to forcibly register and police such people?

Honestly, realistically? Yes, for a number of reasons:

1) There are a wide variety of known superpowers which present extreme opportunities for the commission of crimes, including otherwise 'undetectable' crimes, such as invisibility, telekinesis, shapeshifting, mind control, and so on. Especially in a quasi-realistic setting where people use these powers intelligently and don't always wear brightly colored costumes, this poses a major threat to public order. And it would be impossible to police, respond to, or in some cases even detect such crimes without knowing who is capable of them. Having a list of all the invisible men in Chicago is a reasonable precaution for the Chicago police, in case an invisible purse snatcher starts committing robberies.

Tell me, how would you feel about having a list of registered Muslims in case their was a Jihadi attack?

No, its not an exact parallel, but what you're talking about is singling people out and branding them for something they have no control over and which doesn't automatically make them a bad person.

The difference is that super humans can fight back a hell of a lot more effectively than most oppressed minorities.

2) There is a wide gap between the level of the typical amateur superhero vigilante and a trained fighting force. Having large numbers of super-vigilantes (including people who grossly overestimate the value of their powers and get into situations they can't handle) poses a lot of threat to innocent bystanders, and to themselves. People who are going to go out on the streets and "fight crime" should at a MINIMUM have the same level of training as real police officers.

Honestly, do you think most people with super powers would become vigilantes in the real world? I doubt it. Its not a career path the average person is interested in following.

Yes, obviously soldiers and law enforcement should be trained. That does not require registration of all super humans.

Given how many random unarmed black men get killed by cops, probably more training than the cops do in the US. Paranoid vigilantes with the power to casually demolish anyone they think is suspicious are not such a great thing. I mean, do we really want a reprise of the Trayvon Martin case, only instead of the killing instrument being George Zimmerman's automatic, it's the metasonic blast of the Masked Discombobulator?

That's a legitimate concern, but its not a justification for racial profiling.

3) In times of crisis, super-powered individuals are a major potential national asset and it may be necessary to mobilize their talents in an orderly manner. Just as we have Selective Service registration set up in case we ever need to reinstate the draft, it is reasonable to have lists of who can and cannot bench-press a mobile home or shoot lasers from their ears.

That sounds an awful lot like race-based forced labour.

4) An organized national registry of who has what superpowers, with some kind of system for assuring they are trained with them, is also an economic asset (some superpowers are marketable abilities you can use to make money... IF there is anyone in a position to certify your powers are safe and stable).

And that's just off the top of my head.

...

You don't need a national registry for people to exploit their powers for economic gains. Obviously their would be standards set for different jobs, as their are for doctors and lawyers and such today. But I don't see that it needs to be something everyone must submit to.

Now, a sensible law involving superhero registration would look very different from how it was handled in Marvel. Among the key points:

1) Since superpowers sometimes come about as an accident or have a sudden onset, there should be a reasonable 'grace period' built into the law.

Well, that's kind of a must for such a thing, unless its to be a pretext to persecute innocent people.

2) Secrecy and privacy should be reasonably assured- this could be difficult to arrange.

No shit.

Their is no way in hell that information could be kept completely safe from leaks.

3) Policing needs to be handled separately by at least two, probably three, distinct agencies, and that's not counting bad guys best taken care of by mundane means (e.g. the Joker is a problem for a very good SWAT team, and Lex Luthor is a problem for the SEC). Off the top of my head...
3a) A superhuman military or paramilitary body that tackles foreign or alien superhuman threats (e.g. alien invasions, gods, etc.)

Foreign invasion is entirely the realm of the military, and should remain so.

Creating special forces (including superpowered troops) to engage superhuman threats as part of the military's Order of Battle is entirely appropriate.

3b) A policing agency responsible for 'low level' super-crime, relatively mundane stuff with minimal collateral damage, but with enough paranormal aspects that normal mundane cops aren't equipped to cope.
3c) There might need to be a third group responsible for dealing with high collateral damage threats native to the US (e.g. the Hulk).

Agreed.

Though we shouldn't look at this from a purely American perspective.

4) It would be absurd to require all super-powerful people to train for combat or anything like that. Such training would only be require of people who seriously intend to run around fighting.

Agreed entirely.

[Q99]

It depends a lot on the commonness. Too many supers and it gets tricky (view the My Hero Academia universe). But for more moderate amounts, like if there's thousands to tens of thousands of supers ala most hero worlds-

Forcibly register? Nah, give an automatic paycheck to every superhero who has powers who doesn't use them for crime. A 'don't be a supervillain,' paycheck essentially, to any who want it (if they want to stay off the docket, fine, but most will voluntarily). Set up a power database of powers so you can know to *request* aid if their particular power is needed (in exchange for a lump sum if they respond to such a request, no penalty if they don't). Then if a super someone actually wants to work for you or some other authorized group, pay them a lot more- the Avengers paycheck so to speak.

Use well-paid police Supers to go after the supervillains. Have most of the rest of the super population be happy with you.

[The Romulan Republic]

Giving superpowered people money for doing nothing, it'll breed resentment among everyone else toward them because they'll be getting "free handouts". The Republican/libertarian talking points almost write themselves.

[Q99]

Giving superpowered people money for doing nothing, it'll breed resentment among everyone else toward them because they'll be getting "free handouts". The Republican/libertarian talking points almost write themselves.

Sure. So? If someone has laser eyes, then making sure they're not poor and desperate outpaces other concerns... especially if it pays off with more supers willingly working for us and a much lower supervillain crime rate.

[The Romulan Republic]

The problem is, good idea or not, I'm not sure it would fly politically.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Then don't sell it as "paying them to do nothing" but rather "paying them to stay on the side of law and justice and the American Way (TM)" even if they are only passively doing so. Focus attention on those who accept the bonus payments for helping with things or the Avengers-style on-call Superhero team.

Besides, you're thinking of how it wouldn't fly in the US right now. I think have actual, documented, empiracally-tested and peer-reviewed superpowered mutants appearing as part of your population would change a few political views.

And if some uppity Republicans do object, tell them it's an investment in national security. The more mutants take the payments, the more known and registered mutants you have (to deter other nations in a "look how many we've got" way) who will also be friendly to the government and will be less inclined to go the supervillain route.

Sell it as a preventative measure to avoid fighting them in future: "For every $1 spent paying them to be normal citizens we save $50 on fighting them and cleaning up collateral damage."

[Lord Revan]

I think something like this needs to be worked with the Superhero community in a way that Superheroes who don't want to have their identity become public or cannot have it become public can keep their "superhero" and "civilian" identities secret from the public (at least in theory). Basically first part here must be to make sure that semi-lawful heroes don't feel threatend.

Make the registry so that it essentially polices itself, from what I've gathered why the registry on Marvel failed was that the cost of being on the registry outweighted the benefits by a rather large margin.

I mean goverments keep the identity of their intelligence agents secret for the most part so why not superheroes that have registered with the goverment. Basically make supers that want to fight crime essentially freelance goverment agents and those supers have just want to have a boring office job and a house in the suburbs allow them to have that without having to disclose their identity to the public.

[Simon_Jester]

And it would be impossible to police, respond to, or in some cases even detect such crimes without knowing who is capable of them. Having a list of all the invisible men in Chicago is a reasonable precaution for the Chicago police, in case an invisible purse snatcher starts committing robberies.

How are you going to force the invisible purse snatcher to confess his or her invisibility powers ahead of time? Wouldn't "failure to register superpowers" just be another charge you could throw at the perp AFTER you catch them?

This argument precisely parallels one of the major arguments used against gun control: "if having unregistered superpowers is a crime, only criminals will use unregistered superpowers."

Before I pursue this issue further, I would like to ask: what is your position on a national gun registry database?

1) There are a wide variety of known superpowers which present extreme opportunities for the commission of crimes, including otherwise 'undetectable' crimes, such as invisibility, telekinesis, shapeshifting, mind control, and so on. Especially in a quasi-realistic setting where people use these powers intelligently and don't always wear brightly colored costumes, this poses a major threat to public order. And it would be impossible to police, respond to, or in some cases even detect such crimes without knowing who is capable of them. Having a list of all the invisible men in Chicago is a reasonable precaution for the Chicago police, in case an invisible purse snatcher starts committing robberies.

Tell me, how would you feel about having a list of registered Muslims in case their was a Jihadi attack?

No, its not an exact parallel, but what you're talking about is singling people out and branding them for something they have no control over and which doesn't automatically make them a bad person.

The difference is that super humans can fight back a hell of a lot more effectively than most oppressed minorities.

No, but at least having a list of the, say, twelve invisible people in Chicago gives you a place to start looking for your invisible robber or serial rapist or whatever.

The difference between "racial profiling" and what I'm describing here is simple. Except in a world that would have to be drastically unusual even by comic book standards, superpowers are very rare, and in most cases are distinctive (few individuals have precisely similar powers). "Is a black person" is a very inadequate reason to suspect someone of a crime, because of the many thousands of other black people in the area who didn't do it, creating a long list of potential false positives.

On the contrary, "is stronger than an elephant" or "shoots lasers from her eyes" are very rare traits. These are relevant pieces of information the police might justifiably consider when thinking about who are the suspects for a crime.

To make it simple, if a ten foot tall radioactive giant commits a crime, it isn't "racial profiling" to limit the list of suspects that merit police investigation to include only ten foot tall radioactive giants.

2) There is a wide gap between the level of the typical amateur superhero vigilante and a trained fighting force. Having large numbers of super-vigilantes (including people who grossly overestimate the value of their powers and get into situations they can't handle) poses a lot of threat to innocent bystanders, and to themselves. People who are going to go out on the streets and "fight crime" should at a MINIMUM have the same level of training as real police officers.

Honestly, do you think most people with super powers would become vigilantes in the real world? I doubt it. Its not a career path the average person is interested in following.

Yes, obviously soldiers and law enforcement should be trained. That does not require registration of all super humans.

I explicitly address this below, so I'm just going to treat this as a random blast of hot air on your part.

Given how many random unarmed black men get killed by cops, probably more training than the cops do in the US. Paranoid vigilantes with the power to casually demolish anyone they think is suspicious are not such a great thing. I mean, do we really want a reprise of the Trayvon Martin case, only instead of the killing instrument being George Zimmerman's automatic, it's the metasonic blast of the Masked Discombobulator?

That's a legitimate concern, but its not a justification for racial profiling.

Since I've already explained the difference between "racial profiling" and "ten foot tall radioactive giant profiling," this is hopefully a non-issue by now.

Meanwhile, the concern certainly justifies serious efforts. Having untrained or undertrained people running around 'patrolling the community' is potentially disastrous. They have no one to cover their liability is they accidentally cause harm to innocents. They have no organized training in how to coordinate with emergency services. They may not know nearly as much about how to fight while minimizing collateral damage as they should.

Metahumans who intend to do 'superheroics' on a regular basis should definitely be expected to play by rules, unless they are content to face criminal charges every time their actions predictably damage others' property or endanger others' lives.

3) In times of crisis, super-powered individuals are a major potential national asset and it may be necessary to mobilize their talents in an orderly manner. Just as we have Selective Service registration set up in case we ever need to reinstate the draft, it is reasonable to have lists of who can and cannot bench-press a mobile home or shoot lasers from their ears.

That sounds an awful lot like race-based forced labour.

"Superhero" is not a "race," not in general.

And, bluntly, I hardly care less if you think it is 'forced labor.' Strictly speaking, it is, and it provides an excellent example of why forcing people to labor is not always wrong. Conscripting superheroes in a national emergency is exactly as moral or immoral as conscription during wartime, which was practiced by virtually every civilized nation in the world within living memory in times of national emergency.

In such an emergency, it is particularly obvious that people would expect to be assigned roles relevant to their talents. If the army conscripts a million men,* they will focus on able-bodied men; is this discrimination in favor of the disabled or the physically weak? If they take the few tens of thousands of draftees with prior experience in IT and computer programming and train them to become computer technicians in the army whether they like it or not, is that 'discrimination' against those who have that experience? No, it is not. It is a basic, common sense use of prior knowledge about other people's skills and abilities in order to survive a time of national emergency.
_________

*Note that it is not sexism which causes me to say 'men.' In the US, at least, women aren't required to register for the draft, so if the Army conscripted a million soldiers they would overwhelmingly be male.

4) An organized national registry of who has what superpowers, with some kind of system for assuring they are trained with them, is also an economic asset (some superpowers are marketable abilities you can use to make money... IF there is anyone in a position to certify your powers are safe and stable).

And that's just off the top of my head...

You don't need a national registry for people to exploit their powers for economic gains. Obviously their would be standards set for different jobs, as their are for doctors and lawyers and such today. But I don't see that it needs to be something everyone must submit to.

You DO need organized certification if people are to use superpowers on a regular basis in a world where (like DC and Marvel) many superpowers are unstable, have secret weaknesses, or have side effects, and where different people with similar powers may have wildly different levels of effectiveness due to differences in training or other personal characteristics.

Among other things, there are people with superpowers who present a legitimate threat to innocent bystanders just by having those powers, unless appropriate steps are taken. Someone who turns into a werewolf whenever a blonde woman whistles is full is quite dangerous, and I would be out of my mind to hire such a person without taking precautions to ensure that the trigger of their powers isn't going to turn up and cause a disaster.

Now, a sensible law involving superhero registration would look very different from how it was handled in Marvel. Among the key points:

1) Since superpowers sometimes come about as an accident or have a sudden onset, there should be a reasonable 'grace period' built into the law.

Well, that's kind of a must for such a thing, unless its to be a pretext to persecute innocent people.

Thought I'd mention it anyway, so as to clearly delineate what a sane registration law looks like when contrasted to the one in Marvel comics.

2) Secrecy and privacy should be reasonably assured- this could be difficult to arrange.

No shit.

Their is no way in hell that information could be kept completely safe from leaks.

True, but it could probably be kept relatively secure. And ultimately, the consequences of someone finding out you have powers are probably not worse than the consequences of people getting all your other personal information. If we accept that the government knows our social security numbers (which it has to since it issued them in the first place), then we're not really sacrificing much to accept that the government knows our superpowers.

3b) A policing agency responsible for 'low level' super-crime, relatively mundane stuff with minimal collateral damage, but with enough paranormal aspects that normal mundane cops aren't equipped to cope.
3c) There might need to be a third group responsible for dealing with high collateral damage threats native to the US (e.g. the Hulk).

Agreed.

Though we shouldn't look at this from a purely American perspective.

Ah, I am sorry. See, I answered essentially this exact question a few years ago, in the specific context of "what would you do if you were president of the United States," so I was remembering my thoughts on the answer I gave at that time and forgot to remove the US-specific references from it.

4) It would be absurd to require all super-powerful people to train for combat or anything like that. Such training would only be require of people who seriously intend to run around fighting.

Agreed entirely.

So why didn't you go back and delete the paragraph earlier where you objected to my saying that combat training would be appropriate for people running around using powers as vigilantes?

[General Zod]

The problem with superpowers is, how do they come about? If it's a genetic mutation then the biggest difference is that you can't really control the source of the powers. New super powered people would be cropping up all the time and you have no effective way of containing them all. Especially the ones with subtle powers that don't want to be found out.

[Formless]

Here is a problem with any kind of registry that Simon et al seem to have either never thought of or are ignoring. What do you think will happen when you propose those laws, only for the superhumans to get politically savvy and form political organizations such as unions or lobby groups? Certainly a few of them are going to be wealthy or have a law degree or be celebrities that will know the ins and outs of the system well enough to seriously fuck with you in the courts or elsewhere. And I'm not talking about an X-Men style superhero team-up, I'm actually thinking of something I saw in a webcomic called Spinnerette where, due to a famous civil rights abuse akin to the Tuskeegee experiment, all the US based superheros formed such an organization to protect their privacy and other rights, with a time travelling Benjamin Franklin as president (oh, due to the rules of time travel he is immortal and invincible until he returns to the 18'th century, but in the meantime he will take advantage of his celebrity status as one of the founding fathers of the country). Point is, these guys have lawyers and money, something far more effective at protecting them from the government than just the fact that some of them can benchpress a building.

[Khaat]

I think a number of things have been overlooked:
1) What defines "superpower"? Is a charismatic politician assumed to be a super-powered individual? Is a super model super-powered? Is it the mutant "X-gene"? Is it demonstrated powers? Is it potential powers? What about the training-and-gear supers (The Batman, Hawkeye, etc.)?
2)if governments decide to do this, why wouldn't private corporations already have been doing it and perhaps oppose the government from getting in on it? "Mr. Parker is a licensed security consultant."

Ideally, authorities would collect those "supers" after commission of ordinary crimes (those they could, anyway) and put the offer in front of them: "You can do 3-6 months for burglary, or you can sign up for our program; voluntary participation, paid training, and a term of service."
We register felons and sex offenders, why not supers as they offend and not before?