Term limit
legal restriction that limits the number of terms an officeholder may serve in a particular elected office
A term limit is a nomination rule which restricts the number of terms a person may run for and serve in a particular elected office. When term limits are found in presidential and semi-presidential systems they act as a method to eliminate the potential for "president for life", check the concentration of power in the executive, and curb authoritarianism. Term limits may be a lifetime limit on the number of terms an officeholder may serve, or a limit on the number of consecutive terms.
According to a 2020 analysis, nearly one in four incumbents who face term limits seek to circumvent the term limits through various strategies, including constitutional amendments, working with the judiciary to reinterpret the term limits, let a placeholder govern for the incumbent, and cancelling or delaying elections. Incumbents that seek to circumvent term limits frequently use repression of the opposition, electoral manipulation and foreign support to enable their circumvention. According to a 2025 research project, attempts to circumvent term limits had become increasingly prevalent in African states over time, with few such attempts prior to 2000 and many such attempts post-2000.
History
Europe
Term limits appear to originate in Europe. They date back to Ancient Greece and the Roman Republic, as well as the Republic of Venice. In ancient Athenian democracy, many officeholders were limited to a single term. Council members were allowed a maximum of two terms.
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This entry incorporates text from “Term limit” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.