YS, it is hard to argue about what did not happen, but one could, for example, imagine small mafia states emerging in American West, centered around religion (Mormons) or natural resources. Maybe because law & order somehow existed in those remote areas, in part because there were enough armed men there. Maybe I watched too many Westerns.
My main thought is that we tend to look at what is lacking and complain and not appreciate what exists. This is how various revolutionaries lured people in the last centuries.
Chofetz Chaim writes that one needs to appreciate how difficult it used to travel, and now that we got trains, one should be thankful for that…