The project investigates the commercial determinants of harm caused by supply of digital gambling in terms of game intensity and risk, value and supply chains, and the economy of surplus to society. The study is composed of three work packages (WP) that focus on the products, the surplus, and the value chains of digital gambling. The first work package analyses the role of intensive game characteristics in the growth of digital gambling. The second work package studies the supply and value chains comparing the industrial structures of traditional and digital gambling offer, the effects of digitalisation on value production and circulation, and their effects on private profits and the gambling surplus destined for public use. The third work package asks who are the actors in the networks of digital gambling globally, and how digital technology in global banking and financing affects the industrial and commercial structures of gambling.
Funding: Academy of Finland
Participants from CEACG: Pekka Sulkunen, Janne Nikkinen, Virve Marionneau, Sébastien Berret.
Partners: Eclectica Research and Training Centre, Prof. Aymeric Brody, (EPITECH university, Paris/France)
The project aims to acquire a profound understanding of the position of silent agents in the knowledge base of legislative processes that concern them, exploring epistemic struggles and questions of representation. Another aim is to disclose mechanism by which impacts occur due to the implementation of legislation. The analyses focus on silent agents whose social position arouses morally charged tensions.
Funding: The Strategic Research Council, Academy of Finland
Partners: University of Helsinki, University of Turku, Tampere University, University of Lapland, Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare and Frisky & Anjoy Oy.
Principal Investigator: Kati Rantala, University of Helsinki
Participants from CEACG: Anu Katainen, Veera Kankainen and Josefin Westermarck are involved in Work Package 5 concerning mental health, substance use and consumer related debt.
The CEACG studies the new casino in Tampere in various dimensions. Currently TRESINO consists of two active projects.
The new Tampere casino: Laying foundations for a longitudinal qualitative study on the impact on gambling behaviour, harm, and the community
The availability of gambling plays a considerable role in gambling consumption. Yet, the impact of availability changes in one type of game on the overall game portfolio and ensuing developments in kind and degree of gambling harm are so far only remotely understood. Also, the comprehension of the underlying mechanisms between availability and gambling consumption as well as the wider impacts on the community remain limited. This is a matter of utmost importance for sound gambling regulation. The proposed study contributes to finding answers to these questions by conducting a longitudinal qualitative interview study in the context of the opening of Tampere’s first casino.
Funding: The Finnish Foundation for Alcohol Studies (ATS)
Scientific Advisory Board: Prof. Søren Kristiansen (Aalborg University, Denmark), Prof. Nigel Turner (The Centre for Addiction and Mental Health CAMH, Toronto/Canada)
Participants from CEACG: Michael Egerer (PI), Paula Jääskeläinen
Gambling as Part of a Regional Experience Economy Concept: A Socio-spatial Evaluation of the New Tampere Casino (2019-)
The study focuses on the Tampere casino project and its social, economic and political expectations by different stakeholders.
Funding: The Finnish Ministry of Social Affairs and Health (STM), The Finnish Foundation for Alcohol Studies (ATS)
Participants from CEACG: Paula Jääskeläinen (doctoral dissertation project), Matilda Hellman & Michael Egerer (supervision)
The Online Marketing of Gambling project analyzes how gambling operators on the Finnish and Swedish gambling markets utilize social media platforms for commercial communication and image building. The project is concerned with content of the communication, and if/to what extent that changed between the years 2017 and 2020. During this period Finland and Sweden’s gambling policy developed in opposite directions, as Finland remained having a monopoly market, whereas Sweden became a license-based gambling market in January 2019.
Funding: Ministry of Health and Social Affairs, Section 52 of the lotteries act. Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare. The Swedish part is supported by funding from the Swedish Research Council for Health, Working Life and Welfare (Forte) under grant 2017-0174 and from Svenska Spel research council under grant FO2016-0017.
Partners: Johan Svensson, The Swedish Council for Information on Alcohol and Other Drugs (CAN)/ Stockholms universitet, Department of Public Health Sciences & Robin Nilsson, The Swedish Council for Information on Alcohol and Other Drugs (CAN)
Participants from CEACG: Matilda Hellman (PI), Veera Kankainen, Mikaela Lindeman, Vilja Männistö. Previously Stella Wahlström and Emmi Kauppila have also been involved in the project.
The research analyses and compares the Finnish, French and Hungarian casino-type gambling markets since the 1970s in order to get a better comprehension of their economic and political contexts and impacts, at the national and local level.
Research question: What are the economic and political implications of casino-type gambling in Finland, France and Hungary?
The objective is to provide analysis and information on the economic and political implications of the Finnish, French and Hungarian casino-type gambling markets and how they influence the structure of this industry since the 1970s. The circulation of value from casino-type gambling to beneficiaries is also analyzed by focusing on the underlying vested interests in each context; and the political competition between these groups.
Funding: The Finnish Foundation for Alcohol Studies (ATS)
Participant: Sébastien Berret (doctoral dissertation project)
This research is connected with the ongoing project “Political Economy of Gambling: circulation of value and vested interests” (PolEG).
In Finland, the profits of the gambling monopoly are distributed to the various non-profit organizations as the form of the state grants. This dissertation project studies the governance and justification of these grants. The project especially focuses on the position of the welfare promoting non-profit organizations as the receivers of the grants.
Funding: The Finnish Foundation for Alcohol Studies
Participant: Veera Kankainen (doctoral dissertation project)