Tarun4u, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Common
Imagine a city without a government, controlled only by corporations. This scenario seems like the dystopian plot for a Netflix series, but in fact such a city exists today. Its name is Gurgaon, it is in India, and it has more than 1 million inhabitants.
India is one of the countries that has the most "regulatory bodies" for any activity, and at the same time, these bodies are among the most corrupt. Which forces companies to pay multiple bribes to do any type of business.
In Gurgaon a single body regulates everything, and therefore only a bribe should be paid to it. Incredible as it may sound, this was more than enough reason for most corporations to move here.
With the corporations large numbers of people were displaced, who needed public services etc. And in the absence of a government to create them, the corporations created them.
Streets, hospitals, train and fire stations, all have been created by corporations, even most of the police are private security forces. As it has been the corporations themselves who have built the streets, most of them do not have names, since the corporations did not bother to name them. And the metro stations have the names of the companies that manage them, such as the Vodafone Station, among others.
This city shows great contrasts. In the portions owned by corporations, the conditions are 1st world, streets, parks and beautiful buildings. Gorgaun is the 56th city in India, according to population, but it is the 8th richest.
However, it is only enough to go out a couple of meters and the change is radical, those who live outside these private hurbujas, lack the most basic services, no electricity, no cables, no aqueducts. They live among the garbage and misery. A sample of the two sides of the same coin, and how IF it is possible to supplant governments with money, and even do a better job in some aspects. But at the same time, it shows how this model leaves a good portion of the population unprotected and without options.
Governments can have many problems, but they seem to be a necessary evil ...