  The effective action for the Polyakov loop serving as an order parameter for
deconfinement is obtained in one-loop approximation to second order in a
derivative expansion. The calculation is performed in $d\geq 4$ dimensions,
mostly referring to the gauge group SU(2). The resulting effective action is
only capable of describing a deconfinement phase transition for
$d>d_{\text{cr}}\simeq 7.42$. Since, particularly in $d=4$, the system is
strongly governed by infrared effects, it is demonstrated that an additional
infrared scale such as an effective gluon mass can change the physical
properties of the system drastically, leading to a model with a deconfinement
phase transition.
