Title: Examining and Analyzing of the Role of Land Legal and De-Facto Tenure Security in the Level of Residents Participation in Improvement Programs: The Case Study of Eslamabad Neighborhood of Tehran, Iran

1Introduction Informal settlement is the last shelter of urban poor for gaining a house. These settlements are faced with many challenges including: hygienic and ecological problems, population density, cultural and socio-economic poverty, low quality services and facilities, informal employment and illegal tenure. It is true that these settlements are deprived from legal tenure security (legal document of ownership) and all the time there is probability of their evacuation by municipal authorities; but there are illegal or extralegal factors which give their residents the hope and motivation to stay in these settlements. These legal and illegal factors together affect economic, social, political and physical conditions of residents. Case Study: The Eslamabad neighborhood with 75 hectares is located in the south region of Tehran is the case study of this research. Now, almost 1082 households live there and there are 1,059 residential units in this settlement. Its population is more than 3747 persons with sex ratio 104(Iran Statistical Center, 2006). Economy of this region depends more on informal market and most of the residents in this neighborhood work in false jobs (colportage, flower shop, smoke shop, etc). (See table 1-1).