  It is shown that the effective string recently introduced to describe the
long distance dynamics of 3D gauge systems in the confining phase has an
intriguing description in terms of models of 2D self-avoiding walks in the
dense phase. The deconfinement point, where the effective string becomes N=2
supersymmetric, may then be interpreted as the tricritical Theta point where
the polymer chain undergoes a collapse transition. As a consequence, a
universal value of the deconfinement temperature is predicted.
