Law Enforcement, Inc.: Difference between revisions

 

{{examples}}

== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==

* The Tokyo Police apparatus was privatized at some point in the history of ''[[Silent Moebius]]''. A major plot point towards the end of the series revolves around this. {{spoiler|Rally buys a controlling interest.}}

* The police in ''[[Hyper Police]]'' are all private companies who compete with each other to catch criminals. The Heroes work for the ''Police'' Company {{spoiler|...Which later goes bankrupt!}}

 

== [[Comic Books]] ==

 

== [[Tabletop Games]] ==

* The [[Dungeons & Dragons]] setting of ''[[Eberron]]'' has plenty. House Deneith is the biggest, but House Medani and House Tharashk do it also. That and everyone of the 13 Dragonmarked Houses (Eberron's equivalent of a [[Mega Corp]]) has its own security service that is however subject to local laws.

* In ''[[Deadlands]]'', the United States initially hired [[Pinkerton Detective]] Agency to serve as [[The Men in Black]]. They later form an official agency to deal with the supernatural; headed by Allan Pinkerton and largely manned by former Pinkerton agents.

* [[Eclipse Phase|Firewall]], as a paramilitary [[Transhuman]] black-ops organization dedicated to containing and neutralizing [[Apocalypse How|x-risks]], would also qualify.

 

== [[Video Games]] ==

* ''[[Baldur's Gate]]'' has the Flaming Fist as the de facto police in both the titular city and the surrounding countryside, despite the Flaming Fist technically being a mercenary company. They still take their roles as law enforcement very seriously. So much so that if you ever fight them, their battle cry is "I AM the law!"

* The city of Rapture in ''[[BioShock (series)]]'' has no official government and originally had no laws; Rapture Security can thus be presumed to have started out as the equivalent of mall rent-a-cops. Even after Andrew Ryan starts ruling over the city with an iron fist, his order to kill a "subversive" citizen is portrayed like a hit job.

 

== [[Western Animation]] ==

* Sandy Springs and the other "contract cities" that have sprung up in New Orleans; their local government is made up of the four guys that sign contracts to allow for CH2M Hill performing all of the actual work.

* Some forms of anarchism believe that such private militias could replace the state law enforcement and do a better job than it does. Anarcho-capitalism, in particular, advocates "private defense agencies"—thus taking the "inc." part of the trope name literally. Its advocates think these agencies would work like the heroic versions of Law Enforcement, Inc., while its critics often argue that their profit motive would lead them squarely into the territory of the corrupt versions of the trope. [[Your Mileage May Vary]].

* Reality in [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/339667.stm the UK]; a [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/hampshire/8174496.stm more recent version] advertises directly to the public in what basically amounts to a protection racket.

* Clamping of cars in cities is often done by a private firm. Many of these have been accused of being overzealous in order to make a profit.

* You get a lot of these on college campuses, especially in the US. Larger, more prestigious, and wealthier schools (especially public colleges) can be important and influential enough to have their own police force. However, many other schools (normally smaller private colleges) tend to rely on the city police.

* There are privately-run prisons in the United States. There have been scandals in which these prisons bribe judges to send more inmates to them, increasing their profits.

 

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