The book explains why and when laws go unenforced in developing countries.

Alisha C. Holland is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Politics at Princeton University, New Jersey. She was a Junior Fellow at the Society of Fellows at Harvard University, Massachusetts. Holland's doctoral dissertation received the Best Dissertation Award from the Urban Politics Section of the American Political Science Association and the Robert Noxon Toppan Award for the best dissertation from the Department of Government at Harvard University. Her research on Latin American and urban politics has appeared in the American Journal of Political Science, American Political Science Review, Comparative Political Studies, and Latin American Research Review.

1. An electoral theory of forbearance; 2. Who votes for forbearance; 3. What enables forbearance: inadequate social policy and squatting; 4. When politicians choose forbearance: core constituencies and street vending; 5. Where forbearance occurs: the role of electoral institutions; 6; Why forbearance continues: path dependencies in the informal welfare state; 7. How forbearance ends: lessons from Turkey.