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The following image shows the quite extraordinary political German stability in the government, namely how much a head of government can survive:

Angela Merkel's tenure as Chancellor compared to heads of government in the EU and UK

Wikipedia shows a somewhat similar situation in the last decades either: only three heads of government in almost four decades.

I am wondering about can the German political system can ensure such stability. The Netherlands comes near this stability, but the vast majority of other EU countries have a way bigger "fragmentation".

Alexei
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    Hungary will also be a strong contender for most stable head of state in the future. Please note that Angela Merkel had to switch coalitions two times in her four terms. The background color of her bar could have been painted a bit different each time. – NoDataDumpNoContribution Mar 02 '22 at 14:47
  • @Trilarion Indeed, I have missed Hungary. I can't say if I am thrilled over the government stability there though. – Alexei Mar 02 '22 at 14:48
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    It's definitely a combination of political stability and luck/coincidence (based on taking Merkel's time in office). Tage Erlander was PM of Sweden for 26 years after World War Two, and they had 4 different PMs between 1940 and 1986 (when Olof Palme was assassinated). Britain had 3 PMs in the 28 years from 1979 to 2007. – Stuart F Mar 02 '22 at 15:20
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    @alexei Long terms alone aren't a value by itself. If you have a good leader you'll have it for longer but the same also applies in the other direction. I think that a term limit would be an insurance against bad luck with bad leaders, but then bad leaders tend to cancel the term limit whenever they would have it otherwise, so you may as well have none from the beginning. – NoDataDumpNoContribution Mar 02 '22 at 22:14

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