The Independents

The Independents is an umbrella term for all stations, colonies, planets and systems with their own governments and regulations and not the size or lack the infrastructure of a nation. They usually don't have the power to manage multiple colonies, though some exceptions apply.

Life on Independent Worlds
Life in independent worlds is very tough and crime ridden at worst, with gangs running the streets and criminals ruining lives. Colonies mostly rely on mercenaries and privately hired security to protect them, often with inflated cost and varying degrees of effectiveness. Some stations are protected by the same people who are robbing them of their goods, using their power to inflict more crime than to prevent, or gladly accepting bribes to turn the other cheek when pirates loot warehouses or rob stores.

At best, independent worlds are often very isolated and free from any kind of communication or transport to worlds other than their own. Luddite colonies, free from any kind of technology they believe to be works of the devil or a plague on humankind, living off the land on badly terraformed planets or abandoned Earth-like worlds. This isolation often leads to more sinister groups of people to brew instead, cults and religious fanatics, twisting the word of their ancestors who settled there before them.

Saviors of Man
One in particular is the Luddite colony, the so-called Saviors of Man who believe that technology that was created by mankind was actually given to them by the devil. Anyone who turns up on their planet who was not born there, will be subject to immense amount of humiliation and even torture in order to "purify" their soul, after which they'll become part of their planet spanning community. Should these individuals have cybernetics of any kind, they'll have their augments forcibly removed as they believe it has tainted their bodies, often carefully in surgery but sometimes less traditionally.

Relationships with Corporations
Independent colonies mostly depend on products and services provided by corporations which provide essential resources such as food, water, oxygen as well tools, weapons, vehicles, ships, manpower etc. This creates a complex economy which spans the colonized worlds, with many settlements having a wide variety of wants and needs but most importantly the core requirements of sustaining life like oxygen, water and food.