Regulating Gambling Activities and Public Utility Regulators - Literature review Example

I. Introduction Gambling is an engagement enjoyed by many individuals, in this period of enhanced leisure time that is probable to gain acceptance. This implies that more of the defenceless will be open to all elements to risk and can develop patterns of engagement in which they mislay discipline of their behaviour and put themselves and their loved ones to problems which may lead to unacceptable suffering for all involved. Risk taking is a stimulating activity for numerous individuals, and it is exhilarating and, when triumphant, gives a sense of thrill and gratification to the partakers. Knowledge of the threats and education in lessening them and recognizing the consequences of the entire array of problems will allow rational people to settle on an appropriate decision of whether they desire to be involved or not. Hence the questions are what can be undertaken for the individuals out into risk? Are there sets of individuals who are pathological idealists? People oftentimes read of soldiers enlisted to war who, being aware that people are being hauled down in hundreds, are certain that they will be the people to continue to live the tale. The Chairman of the recent Royal Commission on Gambling Rothchild, in a talk on BBC Television, remarked on how trivial the man in wandering in the street recognized risks and risk taking (Collins, 2003). The solution is not to take on a paternalistic function and permit the government, religious institutions, or some other societies to take over and guide people’s lives and avoid them from taking the risks they desire. There is no plain solution to the dilemma, and three Royal Commissions have shown that it is never through legislation that people are safeguarded from themselves. The solution rests in the arena of scholastic endeavour and never with legislation (ibid, 78). A contemporary body of work addresses a prospering sub-discipline that fascinates several political analysts, policy scientists, legislators and political students generally. Morality policy, as it is popularly referred to, embraces a broad-ranging variety of political issues from abortion and gay rights to mercy killing or euthanasia, substance abuse, sex trade and gambling (Barker, 2000). Core questions bind these apparently dissimilar dimensions of public policy together; should the government be designing policy in this discipline? Should the government ever gain benefits from the pleasure-seeking behaviours of its citizens? Is it adequate to plainly prohibit certain types of immoral conduct, or should the government sternly put into effect its morality statutes? The description of what meets the standard of a morality policy rests not in any inherent, unbiased feature of a regulation or the substantive theme; a policy is recognized as a morality policy or not founded on the belief of the actor involved and the conditions of dispute among them. Morality policies, hence, can be differentiated through debate over initial premises, principles that are shown as self-evident, and that result in to decisive conflicts of values that cannot be reconciled through argument. When conflict between these key values generate disagreement, such the moment orthodox Protestant held that gambling is immoral and individuals of other religions believe gambling is a benevolent kind of amusement, then political movement becomes indispensable to codify the dominant value (Collins, 2003). II. Review of Related Literature Psychoanalysis of Problem Gambling The earliest psychological framework to the investigation of why people gamble has been the perspective that gambling, in its immoderation, is a problem or pathological, a manifestation of fundamental psychopathology. Even though there is insufficient amount of literature on gambling, so far the most widespread framework has been the psychiatric approach. A great deal of the work originates from the assumptions of Sigmund Freud. As a matter of fact, the father of psychoanalysis himself had some remarks on gambling. In his well-known work on Dostoevsky, who is a self-proclaimed problem gambler, Freud explains gambling as an alternative for masturbation, which as well requires the hands and also results in both stimulation and remorse. Freud views gambling as behaviour disorder obsession, originating from the primitive accumulation of masturbation, in which the consequent stimulation is higher than the resulting fretfulness (Schwartzberg, 1998). Gambling, in this perspective, is illogical and it resembles more of instinct, with the demand to be defeated or lose as a self-inflicted chastisement. Preceding Freud’s work, Simmel (1920) presented an early model of a psychoanalytic description. He illustrated a juvenile individual for whom gambling “serves the unfolding or the substitute formation of the exceedingly active pre-genital analsadistic libido in the unconscious” (Simmel, 1920, 353, as cited in Barker, 2000, 83). Another framework assumed by a Freudian associates gambling to addictive indicators aiming to make a way into the future. Gambling is hence a concern of fate, with fate as a punishing father replacement. The paper of Bergler (1943) is extensively cited in more current commentaries on gamblers. He illustrates the gambler as disturbed, who has an unaware desire to lose. Bergler describes whom he is depicting through outlining the following six indicators, “The gambler habitually takes chances; the game precludes all other interests; the gambler is full of optimism and never learns from defeat; the gambler never stops when winning; despite initial caution, the gambler eventually risks relatively too large sums; ‘pleasurable-painful tension’ (thrill) is experienced between the time of betting and the outcome of the game” (as cited in Lester, 1979, 55). Bergler perceives gambling as rationally unexplainable; gambling is embedded in the unconscious of the partakers. It links to the child’s imagination of power characterized by an overblown self-esteem and megalomania. With considerable difficulty, the child surrenders the dream of power. Even as grown-ups, even though people go back to the reality paradigm, they unconsciously aspire for paradisiacal power. Gambling, in the perspective of Bergler, functions to set off the ancient illusion of splendour and megalomania, in that it triggers dormant rebellion against rationality, self-discipline, and morals. In a psychological framework, gambling is both unaware antagonisms and unaware self-inflicted punishment for that antagonism. Allegedly, the gambler unconsciously desires to lose so as to compensate the cost for that antagonism against the educational influence of childhood. In this perspective, the rationale problem gamblers never cease when they experience winnings is due to the fact that they truly want to lose (ibid, 56). As Bergler (1943) maintained, “only a specific subgroup of a specific group of neurotics makes up gamblers” (388, as cited in Lester, 1979,). He calls verbally degenerate individuals who initially unconsciously aggravate a situation wherein they are rejected, then direct themselves in self-protection against their perceived adversaries, and in the end celebrate in self-pity, taking pleasure on unconscious psychic masochistic stimulation. The gambler declines parental guidance and ethical premises through playing a game in which risk is ultimate. Bergler provides a classification of three definite types of gamblers. Traditional gamblers show all six indicators; their problem is anchored on protest against the reality assumption. Another type involves men who unconsciously yearn to be overcome by a father-replacement due to their unaware feminine recognition with mother. The third type gambles in order to protect one’s self against the womanly desire of being sexually overpowered (Lester, 1979). Bergler’s assumption was abundant with various psychoanalytic theories, but did not sufficiently verify the typology in regulated investigation. Greenson (1947) and Berkman (1958) both presented details on the omnipotence assumption (as cited in Cabot, 1998, 133). Greenson believes that the gambler feels powerful and is forced to challenge fortune, the omnipotent personality who can be impotent. Berkman argued that gambling provides a feeling of supremacy and is essentially a rebellion against the constraints designed by society. He as well cites Galdston’s assumption that problem gamblers are imploring for a display of favour, because as youngsters, they were on no account certain of their parents’ love and affection. Galdston (1960) illustrates one story of a man “compulsively acting out a plea to Lady Luck, symbolic of the surrogate figures, mother and father, but mainly mother, for a show of favour, for the affirmative response to the question ‘Do you love me?” (554, as cited in Cabot, 1998, 133). The gambler by no means obtains a perfect and encouraging answer, and so he carries on to play until he finally loses. Behavioural Perspective on Problem Gambling Upon coming in the playing room of a casino, an onlooker is fascinated by a range of frantic activity of massive proportion. An incessant flow of people is coming in and abandoning the casino floor. Factually hundreds of individuals stir around, obviously, in a haphazard manner. Some diligently engage themselves to their preferred activities; playing cards and dice, or slot machines. Others take a pew at small tables with concoctions, conversing or observing other people. The players themselves display a broad array of behaviours varying from mild-mannered, composed movements carried out with blank expression, to frantic activity, apparently in pursuit of some heavenly sign from Lady Luck. Even though the behaviour is dissimilar in typology, all the partakers are committed in functionally identical behaviour. They are all staking monetary value so as to gain more money. Everyone is gambling. Even though this plain reality is apparent, the concerns of what players are doing turn out to be more multifaceted when an individual raise other further fascinating questions such as, “Why do people engage in gambling behaviour? How does the behaviour develop? And, how is the behaviour maintained?” (McGowan, 1994). The concluding answer to these concerns is reliant, to a significant extent, on the level of analysis of the behaviour. A micro analysis directs one to perceive the whole sequence of joining the gambling situation, staking, scrutinizing the result, and continuing gambling as a unitary behaviour. When analyzing gambling from this framework, one overlooks chronological features of the behaviour. Each wager and consequence is not independently explored. A micro analysis requires that one addresses the life-threatening feature of the whole succession of incidences, specifically, net gain or loss. A molecular framework, on the contrary, demands that each wager, and result, be investigated and functionally associated to the earlier and subsequent wagers and outcomes. This extent of analysis puts importance on sequential consequences over each tryout (Barker, 2000). Even though it is probable that both frameworks present prospect to better comprehend gambling, the molecular approach directs one towards a plainer, and thus a more easily regulated framework. To the extent that regulation is valued, a molecular investigation is considered necessary. The psychoanalytic approach remains absolute with respect to the total quantity of words, written to elaborate about gambling behaviour. Fuller (1975) describes gambling as a “reallocation of wealth, on, the basis of deliberate risk, involving gain, to one party and loss to another, usually without the introduction of productive work on either side” (112 as cited in Collins, 2003, 102). The description is quite satisfactory, as it is adequately encompassing to integrate most widespread types of gambling. One might as well emphasize that the description involves guesswork in stock market, real estate and commodities. Furthermore, it is simple to notice majority of types of insurance like life insurance and liability security, also obey the rules of the description. Insurance includes safeguarding oneself against the threat of loss, and definitely involves a reordering of wealth. Fuller insists to argue that this behaviour is encouraged by an effort to shield against an unaware anal fixation. He perceives the behaviour as an addictive neurosis. Based on the argument of Freud that babies who are inclined towards constipation grow a sentiment of great importance for feces, which eventually is substituted by monetary value, Fuller maintains that the gambler is transferring his desire to have fun with feces (Strang, 1957). In view of the fact that all gambling is characterized by fooling around with money, gambling, as Fuller sees it, embodies a general deterioration to the anal stage of development. In confirmation of this conclusion, Fuller stresses the natural usage of feces in the language of the gambler such as ‘the game craps’ sated with ‘coming out the hard way,’ ‘they’re rolling,’ ‘the don’t pass line’ and ‘making it the hard way.’ This subjective substantiation is far from compelling. One could simply indicate phrases popular to geology like ‘fault slippage’, ‘sink holes’, ‘extrusions’, and ‘bowels of the earth’, and come to the conclusion that geologists, also, endure general anal fixation (ibid, 162). Sociological Perspective on Problem Gambling Gambling is a force in society that sociologists have investigated recurrently. Certainly, little theoretical attempt has integrate gambling, and until currently, survey information on the recurrence of gambling and the personalities of gamblers were practically nonexistent. Most probably the misdemeanour of gambling puts off its addition in assumptions of society for the reason that it was perceived as a type of delinquent behaviour, rather than as a prevalent engagement taking place throughout society. A number of criminologists emphasized the commonalities between gambling and tolerable business engagements, but the primary curiosity in gambling concerned premises for and in opposition to decriminalization of ‘victimless crimes’, for instance, sex trading, gambling and substance abuse (McGowan, 1994). With the growing legalization and control, of gambling in some developed states, gambling has turned out to be rather less recognized with criminality and delinquency but is remains to be seen as an unconstructive activity by several individuals. An investigation of high school students points out that students perceive gamblers as mainly resembling gangsters, killers, moles and assassins. Joyce (1976) stresses that general survey inquiries regarding gambling obtain responses contrary to the activity, yet more exact questions which point to a specific type such as sports betting or lotteries, do not (as cited in Lester, 1979, 72). There is apparently ambiguity in outlooks regarding gambling, and it has not turned out to be an entirely satisfactory form of amusement. Nevertheless, a national survey carried out in 1975, discovered that the legalization of gambling seems to boost advocacy and involvement by citizens (ibid). Possibly, as legal gambling becomes more widespread in developed countries, sociologists will try to incorporate risk taking activities into their investigations of society. III. Analysis Scholars delineate between the ‘problem’ gambler and the ‘pathological’ gambler. As Shaffer argues, pathological gamblers show signs of the three basic characteristics, which are, powerlessness to stop gambling in spite of huge losses, a sense of lost in self-discipline, and an impulse or obsession to gamble. Problem gamblers on the other hand can be affected in less serious manners, involving difficulty focusing, failure to perform family, school or work responsibilities, general bad temper, and drowsiness. The two, nevertheless, are closely related (Barker, 2000). Shaffer points to problem gamblers as being in conversion oftentimes move in and out of these delineations. It is approximated that “1 to 3 percent of the adult population are pathological gamblers, but nearly twice that number are problem gamblers” (ibid, 114). Perhaps 90 percent of the entire population can leisurely gamble, adolescents, also adults, though they differ in their strength. The most addictive include the component of abrupt action and take place in comparative isolation, Shaffer claims. Internet gambling and slot machines are intrinsically more hazardous than lottery or bingo. However, the lottery oftentimes functions as an access to other gambling engagements for adolescents. One open to the elements to even a comparatively benevolent type of gambling such as the lottery, numerous discover themselves yearning greater pleasure. Researches reveal this: Involvement in other types of gambling is greater in those states that tolerate lotteries (Barker, 2000, 116). Lots of problem and pathological gamblers, teenagers or grown-ups, become debtors. The moment they get in above their heads, adolescent gamblers tag along the prompt of their elders; they resort to crime. Jacobs reveals that at least one in 10 young individuals has used unlawful ways such as stealing, burgling, selling illegal drugs, or sex trading to get money to recompense gambling-associated debts. A 1994 research on Massachusetts adolescent discovered that 5 percent had been seized for gambling-associated problems (Collins, 2003, 98). In spite of the extent and effect of youth gambling, Jacob maintains, the level of public responsiveness is completely terrible. Adolescents themselves stay mainly ignorant of the dangers related with gambling. Shaffer discovered that merely one-quarter of adolescent in Massachusetts that were surveyed rated gambling as greatly risky, evaluated with 60 percent or more who professed the hazards in alcohol, cigarettes and drugs. Gambling in all its types is demonstrating to be almost appealing to a growing generation that oftentimes informs pollsters of its anxieties regarding an unwelcoming economic attitude. Conventional types of gambling such as church lotteries have commonly been able to limit compulsive gambling. Government endorsement of gambling, counting the $350 million administrations spend promoting the lottery, has been more harmful (ibid, 99). It converses to adolescents the delicately harmful idea that the work ethic is outdated, that what they truly need is money and a dream. However, gambling in the UK has been shown to be a countrywide engagement among the adult population and perhaps a substantial percentage of the younger generation. Contentions regarding a proper attitude have spanned between two conflicting perspectives. Some view gambling as a natural, enjoyable pastime giving stimulation, interest, and respite of dullness to counteract the monotonous boredom of the workplace. It is understood that individuals are allowed to decide for their own behaviour and that it would be a mistake for the larger society, through its legislative mechanism, to try to regulate, identify, or control those engagements that are preferred for respite, given that they do not create unwarranted harm to other individuals. Moreover, the gambling commerce presents employment to a broad array of individuals spreading out from the book makers, jockeys, racehorse possessors, and the casino owners on the one hand, all the way through the football pool coupon seller, the croupiers and those provisionally given a job to dispose garbage from the racecourse. People who have a vested interest in gambling involve the government, which obtains funds from taxation and more particularly, endorses its own gambling services via the ‘totalizator’ and ‘Premium Bonds’ (Lester, 1979, 185); it is as well considering a National Lottery. Several religious institutions and other open-handed organizations also rely on lotteries for a portion of their income (ibid). The opposite argument specifies a moral point at the motivation of attaining financial success with no industry and the pursuit for a way out to financial predicaments through a bonus from Destiny relatively than the application of attempt, determination, commitment, mutual trust, and a number of virtues to the search for success. Probably a more contemporary perspective of the moral dilemma is to dispute the participation of the gambling commerce with organized crime, debatable ethics, extortion, scam and hostility. The impacts of ‘easy money’ on the larger society, and on individuals specifically were shown, earlier than the current legislation, through reference to the sinful metropolitan regions of continental Europe and North America in which gambling is unregulated (McGowan, 1994, 38). Attention is as well focused to the effects on people, who, even though triumphant in obtaining affluence as the result of unparalleled triumphs at the football pools or casinos, drastically squander, lose, give away, or are stripped away of their wealth by gluttonous observers. People do not apparently informed of those winners who diffidently and logically care of their acquired riches through gambling without adjusting their mode of life to any higher degree, they are by no means news (ibid). At time one hears of the impact of gambling on people and their loved ones when they become preoccupied in the gambling engagement that their conduct can no longer be regulated and they squander not just money kept for amusement activities but also the financial budget for house rent, food, and other basic necessities. They may spend more than they are capable of spending and sometimes leads to spending things belonging to others, loaned or stolen, placing them at peril of criminal suit and humiliation. This perspective that gambling is unconstructive and have to be regulated is advocated by the larger society, the government, the law enforcement, and its social support system which have to regulate or to address the needs of particular groups and segment of populations who are incapable to handle their own behaviour. The churches, as well, view the problems more specifically of the individual and his loved ones and realize the necessity for constraint of gambling if not its prevention (McGowan, 1994). Here an observer notices the irony of the gambling dilemma. For, generally, it is the same set of organizations that represents to take advantage from the gambling that as well senses the strain to regulate it. The government and the religious organizations obtain income from the gambling industry, to mention nothing of the several who toil in the industry. However, numerous of these same individuals are anxious at the manner in which this behaviour may be uncontrollable, be caught up in the criminal realm or create dilemmas for people, which lead to financial and individual difficulties. Governments have hence been at thoroughness to attempt to survey the condition and to present a greater or lesser measure of self-discipline in harmony with the recent outlooks and demands of society at the moment. IV. Conclusion Individuals gamble for multiple, and occasionally multifaceted, reasons. Leisure gambling may be risk-taking, adventure-seeking, or may be something current to do on a boring night. It can be exhilarating, disappointing, and sometimes dull. The growth of casinos and the increase in casino consumption presents the possibility for productive consumer studies into vested interests and consumer objectives, and further investigation on recreational consumption generally. More intuitively, it perhaps is that gambling, including other types of experimental consumption such as spending on professional sport, white-water rafting, and dangerous leisure activities such as skydiving, can all be helpfully understood with the common classification of interests and behaviours. Doing so would integrate these multiple activities into a more controllable theoretical pattern. More often than not, the government implements regulations to safeguard the public. This protection is derived from various forms such as equal prices, quality products, deposit indemnities, and others, but the fundamental goal of safeguarding the public hangs on consistent. As a matter of fact, when the government considers industry or commerce practices biased, it oftentimes interfere to impose punishments or regulation so as to rework the defects. It can be contended that gambling is not dissimilar. Regardless of the rationale, the incapability to tolerate gambling as a lawful venture, the demand to shut out organized crime, or the yearning to lessen social costs, every time gambling is recognized, it is controlled. Nonetheless, often those accountable for regulating gambling activities are as well dependent on tax revenues from gambling, probably more so compare to other regulators such as public utility regulators. Rivalry from nearby jurisdictions providing casino gambling under a more loose regulatory administration poses an enticement to loosen regulation so as to permit domestic casinos to successfully compete and sustain gambling and tax revenues (Barker, 2000). Independent studies on community effect are all but lacking. Shielded by personal vested interests and economic gain, both supporters and proponents have continuously generated research advantageous to their status. Investigations that are in opposition to their interests have been abruptly ridiculed and dismissed. This division has even overturned government attempts to assess long-and short-term outcomes. On one side of the argument, anti-gambling voices hold responsible the gaming industry for a number of social pathologies including, yet not restricted to, elevated suicide incidences, increased trends of criminal behaviour, and the letdowns of small businesses. Drawing the gaming commerce as the well-known horned devil, they articulate that gamblers are defenceless victims eaten up by ravenous institutions embodying evil in the flesh. On the other hand, the gaming commerce advances itself as community liberator, alleviating impoverished regions out of their economic letdown. Rejecting any unconstructive intentions or implications, they have shown themselves as culpable businessmen preoccupied with the small group of people showing signs of destructive gambling inclinations. While both visualizations are apparently exaggerated to the point of ridiculousness, a depiction somewhere in the middle has not yet been recognized (Collins, 2003). Regardless of its nature, it is obvious that the sudden increase in gambling locations in the recent decades has remarkably influenced community leaders, business organizations, and the public. For the greater part, trivial consideration has been given to suburban problems. Rather, the allure of high revenue and low taxation has attested to be tempting to legislators and politicians pursuing for re-election. Even regions that have conventionally been against legalized gambling have now given up to economic pressures. Undoubtedly, numerous states infamous for their anti-gambling, religious-hitting pasts are currently poised on the threshold of the legalization chasm. References Barker, T. (2000) Jokers Wild: Legalized Gambling in the Twenty First Century, Westport, CT: Praeger. Bergler, E (1957) The Psychology of Gambling. New York, Hill & Wang. Cabot, Anthony. (1998) Internet Gambling Report II. Las Vegas: Trace Publications. Collins, P. (2003) Gambling and the Public Interest, Westport, CT: Praeger. Lester, D. (1979) Gambling Today, Springfield, IL: Charles C. Thomas. McGowan, R. (1994) State Lotteries and Legalized Gambling: Painless Revenue of Painful Mirage, Westport, CT: Quorum Books. Schwartzberg, A. Z. (1998) The Adolescent in Turmoil, Westport, CT: Praeger. Strang, R. (1957) The Adolescent Views Himself: A Psychology of Adolescence, New York: McGraw-Hill. Read More