Careful inspection of state-created institutions and of interactions that surround them may explain many ambiguous details about domestic politics in the Arab world. Advancing this broad message in Structuring Conflict in the Arab World, Ellen Lust-Okar provides analytical tools and case studies that explain the abilities of incumbent elites to use different structures and rules to control their opponents. She tackles gaps in available research affiliated with the conventional wisdom that has failed to explain the absence of unrest in countries experiencing prolonged economic crises or to clarify the strengthening of regimes in countries promoting political liberalization and inclusion of reformist oppositions. This work uses a formal model of politics to study “how state created institutions shape government-opposition relations” (20). It also reviews literatures ranging from modernization, the Third Wave, liberalization, and rational choice theories to the politics of protest and theories of social revolution. To build on earlier models and point to new directions in research on government-opposition relations, Lust-Okar uses Robert Dahl's classic work and diagram of the paths to polyarchy (37).