Leader Tenure through History

• In Event: The Deep History of States

Abstract

• What are the long-term patterns in leader tenure throughout the world. Previous studies have examined specific regions and countries. Our project embraces the entire world, stretching back to the earliest civilizations for which data is available. For each leader, we mark the date of entry and exit and for a subset, beginning in 1500 CE, we also code additional characteristics of the leader and the circumstances of accession and de-accession. We find a secular-historical trend of declining tenure from the earliest years to the present, with an acceleration beginning around 1500. In the paper, we theorize about its causes and test various alternate hypotheses.

Authors

• Lilian Cojocaru

• John Gerring, University of Texas, Austin

• Carl Henrik Knutsen, Department of Political Science, University of Oslo

• Andrej Kokkonen, University of Gothenburg

• Xin Nong, University of Texas at Austin

• Jan Teorell, Stockholm University

• Daniel Smith, Ohio State University

• Cem Mert Dalli, University of Gothenburg