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Law Enforcement, Inc.: Difference between revisions
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{{trope}}
A self-funded, self-supporting <s>vigilante firm</s> private agency which can act as a legal authority and law enforcement power, or as an official military outfit, even with minimal (if any) ties to actual government/military/police organizations. Agents can act as fully deputized and authorized agents of the law and/or government without bothering with official credentials, pesky background checks, and so forth. The strike force can consist of a [[One
There are [[Omniscient Morality License|no pesky "letter of the law" rules and procedures]] which apply to traditional agencies and seem designed to [[Soap Opera Justice|protect the guilty while punishing the innocent]]. The government might even sub-contract the agency to do all its dirty work.
For an actual government agency version, see [[Heroes
''[[Law Enforcement, Inc./Trope Co|This item]] is available from the [[Trope Co/Trope Co|Trope Co]] catalog''
{{examples
== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==
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* The Public Eye police force in ''[[Marvel 2099]]'' work on a for-profit basis. In the intro to ''[[Punisher]] 2099'', a man tries to call for help, but is told that an officer will be sent once the check clears.
* In ''[[The Question]]'', Mayor Myra Fermin was at one point considering disbanding [[Wretched Hive|Hub City's notoriously corrupt police force]] and hiring biker gangs to enforce the law.
* [[
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* The Police in ''[[Jennifer Government]]'', also NRA to some extent, though both factions are mostly mercenaries for corporations.
** It shows up the highly corporate nature of these organisations. Notably, when a Nike employee is (forcefully) contracted to do something blatently illegal, he subcontracts to the Police, who ''themselves'' subcontract the job to the NRA. Nike later contracts the NRA to eliminate the Police manager who handled the original subcontract.
* Although not stated, this is presumably the situation in Han Dold City in ''[[The
* The CorpSeCorps in ''[[Oryx and Crake]]'', who work for the world's [[Mega Corp|Mega Corps]].
* In ''Victory Conditions'', the last book in the [[Vattas War (Literature)|Vattas War]] series, it is discovered that the ''actual'' military of {{spoiler|Nexus}} has been gutted out by long-standing corruption because everybody knew that nobody would ever dare to attack them, and so the defense of the homeworld against [[Space Pirates]] ends up falling to the corporate security forces of the planet's dominant [[Mega Corp]]. They're [[Redshirt Army|poorly equipped and not trained for the task]], {{spoiler|but they ''do'' have [[The Cavalry|outside assistance]].}}
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* Between roughly 1870 and 1930 the Coal and Iron Police had law enforcement powers in Pennsylvania. They were, as the name suggests, paid and run by the coal and iron companies.
* 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.
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