I've paid attention to the Galnet, and made some personal observations and speculations, and have formed the following opinion...
The game creators have borrowed very heavily from reality and current affairs when forming the political backdrop to humanities "bubble", with all the problems that entails.
The Federation: Heavy handed and corrupt. I did notice that the NPC Vice president of Adele's Armada (once my "Home system") stated that she didn't care about space or spaceships, but was only interested in profit...now since that Adele's Armada was founded on keeping the spaceways free of pirates etc. It's safe to assume the whole concept has been corrupted into a mere business, something we see time and again in real life.
So I drifted into Empire space and took up with them...
The Empire: Started with good intention, and instantly taken over by a Meglomaniac on an ego trip, it's never changed, it never will, it never can.Sooner or later that place is going to erupt into a space version of Game of Thrones, it may have already done so.
So grap the rep for a Courier ship and move into Alliance space...
The Alliance: Possibly the joker in the pack, but at present, it's just a collection of fractured interest. It has no means of supporting itself without the help of the other powers, and until it learns to build its own ships will always be no more than a parasite. Yes the alliance is the most outward looking, but it cannot as yet cut the apron string.
None of the three powers can answer the possible threat to humanity. They would unite (in public), but I doubt they would do more than protect their own interest in the event of a "bubble wide" threat. I suspect they would send help, just after the other power had been weakened. (ie the cavalry would arrive just after the nick of time).
Ignoring the past: Humanity has now come to the attention of other races out there in the big black, and we've yet to see what they will make of us. We've arrogantly flown out there without having any clue whose back garden it might be we have set our tent up in. We found "UA's" and what was the first thing most did with them? They used them as toys to cause mischief. Do we know what they actually are? Nope. Let's hope that those UA's are not baby starships (The aliens seem to use bio-ships?) because mommy ship might get upset at her "eggs" being used as bombs.
Anyone notice that the Guardians civilisation had some very close parallels to our own? Hmmm...we are assuming that they are extinct, that may not herald well for humanity and the future.
Like I said, the Devs have humanity summed up, and if they continue down that path to the logical, inevitable conclusion, we pilots are in for a rough ride.
We in the game are assuming humanity are the lords of creation and the "natural winner" in any game driven scenario, the devs are clever people, they may not agree.
Feel free to call me a fool and disagree, or add musings about the overall game plotline yourself.