What aspect of ANY of the major political parties does not "drifts helplessly on the global economic flows, solely concerned with its own survival"?

What big modern political party is not simply a "culture of machine politics, factionalism, control and power"?

Modern democracy, almost by its very structure, ensures that political life revovles around such things: you have a mass of voters who simply want the easy road, and career driven politicans who understand that they can get the furthest ahead, not by forumated good and noble policy, but by giving voters the easy road or indeed buy conducting cheap mud slinging matches against the opposition, be this opposition within the party or outside of it.

The system itself is faulty because it doesn't not function 'well' when all parties (voters and politicians) are most narrowly self-interested and individualistic as they are today.

Postglobalism,
it is true that state governments are limited in what they can do in a global world. But some are better than others. NSW is the worst in the nation.

The Brumby state government in Victoria, for instance, is competent and it is willing to address issues. It is very weak on environmental issues, eg.,

The announcement of a new coal-fired power station in the Latrobe Valley that will be bankrolled in part by a $50 million contribution from the State Government.

Victoria's destructive role in negotiations to save the Murray River. They are fixated on water infrastructure projects as the remedy to over-allocation, climate change and drought and ignore the fact that buying back water for the rivers is the only demonstrated way to boost their flows.

More plans for freeways yet public transport is bursting at the seams and no investment in public transport systems to help reduce transport emissions and oil dependency, and maintain a liveable city.

the Government introduced solar laws that fail to encourage households to install solar panels on their homes. Effective solar feed-in laws could have reduced greenhouse pollution and greatly boosted the solar industry in Victoria with little or no price impact.

Postglobalism
re your comment that

Modern democracy, almost by its very structure, ensures that political life revolves around a mass of voters who simply want the easy road... and career driven politicians who understand that they can get the furthest ahead...by giving voters the easy road..

It is more complex than that. Many voters feel embittered by a world that seems out of control. They prefer a fantasy version of a past white picket fence Australia where so many, who now feel powerless, imagine they might actually have been able to shape their own destinies. They want a world where everyone knows their place and keeps to it, and where everyone could count on clear, inviolable boundary lines -- between races and genders, between competitive individuals in the marketplace, between the virtuous self and the temptations of the flesh,between civilization and the enemies who would destroy it.

Peter,

Ok, so voters are not simply selfish gits. Of course your right and i was being a bit simplistic and presumptuous. But your right on when you say voters deal with a simplistic conception of reality as opposed to reality itself.

And to think they are, as a mass, 'in charge'!

Im sure the politicians know exactly how to manipulate these fancies, in fact they make a career out of it. Can this work for the country in the long term?