Informal Institutions and Democracy: Lessons from Latin America. Edited by Gretchen Helmke and Steven Levitsky. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2006. 368p. $65.00 cloth, $25.00 paper.

It is not very often that an edited book has the potential to carve a new niche in the field. This may be one of those rare volumes. The collection of essays edited by Gretchen Helmke and Steven Levitsky lays out a promising research agenda, not only for Latin Americanists but for students of democratization in general.