Definition of "bargaining"

Seeing the British establishment struggle with the financial sector is like watching an alcoholic […]. Until 2008 there was denial over what finance had become. […] But the scandals kept coming, and so we entered stage three – what therapists call "bargaining". A broad section of the political class now recognises the need for change but remains unable to see the necessity of a fundamental overhaul. Instead it offers fixes and patches.

2013 June 28, Joris Luyendijk, “Our banks are out of control”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 189, number 3, page 21

All the materials, therefore, existed for an interminable series of hagglings, bargainings, and blackmailings.

1934, Winston Churchill, Marlborough: His Life and Times (book 2, page 51)