Policymaking in a multilevel setting: perverse effects on regulating gambling

This article examines how multilevel policymaking influences strategic public management. Multilevel governance arrangements are nowadays a recurrent feature in the public sector; the ability of public authorities to design and implement coherent and effective frameworks is affected by the interaction across multiple levels of government. The research was carried out through a case study focusing on gambling regulation in the Friuli Venezia Giulia Region in Italy. Data have been gathered combining the analysis of documents, interviews and surveys within a few mixed-method research projects (2018–2024). By appreciating gambling policy as a legitimacy-driven and institutionally embedded field, the research allows to see beyond well-known implementation challenges of multilevel policymaking. It shows how incoherent policies and stalemate are not necessarily the result of policy failures but could be due to deliberate decoupling strategic responses. Moreover, the study contributes novel insights on how decoupling operates across governance levels and in multiple directions.