Constitutional Law and Politics

THE LAW AND POLITICS OF PRESIDENTIAL TERM LIMIT EVASION

Mila Versteeg,* Timothy Horley,** Anne Meng,*** Mauricio Guim**** & Marilyn Guirguis*****

Since the turn of the millennium, a remarkably large number of incumbent presidents have managed to stay past the end of their consti­tutionally mandated terms. Russia’s Vladimir Putin, Rwanda’s Paul Kagame, and Colombia’s Alvaro Uribe represent a sizeable collection of presidents who were democratically elected but remained in power long past their original mandates. Such attempts to stay in office are not new, but in recent decades their...