🇫🇷 Term limits in France

France limits its president to two consecutive terms. The cap has been in Article 6 of the Constitution since the constitutional reform of July 23, 2008, and the presidential term itself has been five years since the referendum of September 24, 2000 — so no president can now serve more than 10 unbroken years.

The limit

Article 6 of the Constitution of the Fifth Republic, as amended in 2008, states that no one may hold the presidency for more than two consecutive mandates. Because the cap is consecutive rather than lifetime, a former president may run again after sitting out at least one full five-year term.

Since when

Five-year terms date to the referendum of September 24, 2000, which replaced the seven-year term the Fifth Republic had used since its constitution of October 4, 1958. The two-consecutive-term cap dates to the constitutional reform promulgated on July 23, 2008.

How it was changed

France changed each rule through a formal constitutional procedure. The switch from a seven-year to a five-year term was approved by nationwide referendum on September 24, 2000, and first applied to the term that began in 2002. The two-consecutive-term cap was adopted as part of the wider institutional reform of July 23, 2008, passed by the Congress — both houses of Parliament voting together at Versailles, where constitutional amendments need a three-fifths majority. The president elected in 2017 and re-elected in 2022 is the first bound by the cap: it bars a third consecutive mandate, so no third consecutive term is possible in 2027.

Key facts

  • Two consecutive five-year terms — a 10-year unbroken ceiling (Article 6, Constitution of October 4, 1958, as amended on July 23, 2008).
  • The five-year term replaced the seven-year term by referendum on September 24, 2000; the first five-year presidency began in 2002.
  • The 2008 cap is consecutive, not lifetime: a two-term president may legally run again after an interval (rule in force since July 23, 2008).
  • The president elected in 2017 and re-elected in 2022 cannot seek a third consecutive term in 2027 under the 2008 cap.

How Canada compares

Canada has no equivalent rule at any level. No law or constitutional provision caps how long a Prime Minister may serve — none has since Confederation in 1867 — while French presidents have had a hard 10-year unbroken ceiling since 2008. The longest Canadian cumulative tenure remains 21 years 154 days (William Lyon Mackenzie King, 1921–1930, 1935–1948).

Both countries sit in the G7, yet only some of that group limits tenures: the United States (cap in force since 1951) and France (since 2008) carry constitutional two-term caps, Japan's governing party caps its leader's tenure in practice, and Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, and Italy impose no legal limit on how long a head of government may serve.

France amended by the numbers: a referendum in 2000 and a three-fifths congressional majority in 2008. Canada's route depends on the design of the amendment: the Constitution Act, 1982 lets Parliament act alone under section 44 for changes confined to the federal executive, while designs touching matters reserved to sections 41 and 42 need provincial consent as well. No term-limits proposal has been enacted through either route.

Sources

  • Conseil constitutionnel — Constitution of October 4, 1958, Article 6 (as amended on July 23, 2008).
  • Loi constitutionnelle n° 2008-724 du 23 juillet 2008 de modernisation des institutions de la Ve République.
  • Ministère de l'Intérieur — referendum of September 24, 2000 on the quinquennat (five-year presidential term).

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