Although Lord Lorne loves to deploy social commentary and all, I doubt all of Oddworld is complete and absolute free game for private businesses - though it is an example of when capitalism and industrialism has more power than it should, which leads to chaos. I think the unreleased Magog on the March videos detailing Mullock's supposed survival and impending trial kind of mean there's some kind of council or government around by default.
It probably exists to keep business in line, but in the worst way possible - working in the shadows to squash undesired competition, hold back scientific research to keep traditional methods in power, extortion, all while maintaining a family-friendly face to report back to those underground mole people - the good stuff that Lord Lorne would be inclined to explore.
I don't think there's any kind of environmentalist groups or regulations in this centralized government, or if there is, it is very weak and exploitable. We don't see any evidence of trade unionists or anything really that'd get in the way of a business's endeavors in terms of ethics and this seems to be the kind of world where bribery is either legal, or so commonly done behind the scenes that no one cares.
One way or another though, I think there probably is some kind of centralized government in Oddworld simply because that seems like the kind of thing Lord Lorne would do - he would probably want to use the government itself as some kind of abstract "character" of sorts - an invisible, evil force that's secretly controlling everything on the surface.
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