Negotiated prohibition: The social organisation of illegal gambling in Ukraine

Abstract

This chapter draws on existing legitimacy scholarship in order to develop the concept of negotiated prohibition where power holders and banned service providers engage in mutually beneficial relations in order to secure illicit profits. We build our discussion of negotiated prohibition on the analysis of the 2009 ban on gambling in Ukraine. Our findings are based on data collected during an ethnographic trip to Ukraine undertaken in 2016, during which we conducted semi-structured interviews with representatives of the gambling industry (both those who operated before and after the 2009 gambling ban) in order to examine the relationship between power holders and gambling entrepreneurs. This chapter suggests that negotiated prohibition leads to the emergence of a fragmented and flexible social order that is characterised by discretionary enforcement of the ban and corrupt arrangements.