Like all set-ups, there’s obvious pros and cons. Like you said, short terms normalize change so it’s more difficult to consolidate power against an opposition (not that they don’t try! See long-term examples in USA like gerrymandering and voter suppression). It also theoretically allows the peoples of a democracy to re-establish their choice of leadership more often in response to major changes, like a war or global pandemic. If you realize a mistake was made, like voting in a naive TV celebrity, then you have a reasonable guarantee that the state population can vote to remove them in a few years without needing a violent revolution. Obviously that’s great, and something many people living under malevolent dictatorships would literally die for.
A big downside is that it creates instability and disincentivizes long-term planning. Many necessary changes take longer than 3-5 years to make, and many nations have a two-party dominant system (usually characterized as a dichotomy of conservative/progressive) where one party is in power for 4-8 years before the other takes power and undoes many of those changes and cancels their projects. Rinse and repeat. As an extreme example, you can see many people pointing to non-democratic nations as being efficient at making infrastructural and social change, China being a popular example for a long time. They can comfortably make 5 year plans because they’re still likely to be there in 10 or 20. Shanghai venture capitalist Eric Li hints at this: “I make the joke: in America you can change political parties, but you can’t change the policies. In China you cannot change the party, but you can change policies.” If you don’t like the main party’s basic world-view, you have no choice! That’s horrifying in itself. But if you do, there’s more capacity for major change than in the tug-of-war in a short-term western democracy.
It used to be a lot worse in the US, with much of the government changing every few years. The introduction of the civil service brought a measure of stability, where political appointees ultimately are responsible for carrying out the vision of the president but the actual work is carried out by career employees that are often with agencies for decades. The establishment of similar institutions is a goal in less established governments to dial down the stakes on elections. It’s not uncommon to have governments where employment is tied to party, tribe, or ethnicity. Not only is merit a secondary concern so the government is run by ill suited employees, but each election is a high stakes battle for the employment status of a good chunk of the population. A healthy civil service sidesteps all of this.
Like all set-ups, there’s obvious pros and cons. Like you said, short terms normalize change so it’s more difficult to consolidate power against an opposition (not that they don’t try! See long-term examples in USA like gerrymandering and voter suppression). It also theoretically allows the peoples of a democracy to re-establish their choice of leadership more often in response to major changes, like a war or global pandemic. If you realize a mistake was made, like voting in a naive TV celebrity, then you have a reasonable guarantee that the state population can vote to remove them in a few years without needing a violent revolution. Obviously that’s great, and something many people living under malevolent dictatorships would literally die for.
A big downside is that it creates instability and disincentivizes long-term planning. Many necessary changes take longer than 3-5 years to make, and many nations have a two-party dominant system (usually characterized as a dichotomy of conservative/progressive) where one party is in power for 4-8 years before the other takes power and undoes many of those changes and cancels their projects. Rinse and repeat. As an extreme example, you can see many people pointing to non-democratic nations as being efficient at making infrastructural and social change, China being a popular example for a long time. They can comfortably make 5 year plans because they’re still likely to be there in 10 or 20. Shanghai venture capitalist Eric Li hints at this: “I make the joke: in America you can change political parties, but you can’t change the policies. In China you cannot change the party, but you can change policies.” If you don’t like the main party’s basic world-view, you have no choice! That’s horrifying in itself. But if you do, there’s more capacity for major change than in the tug-of-war in a short-term western democracy.
It used to be a lot worse in the US, with much of the government changing every few years. The introduction of the civil service brought a measure of stability, where political appointees ultimately are responsible for carrying out the vision of the president but the actual work is carried out by career employees that are often with agencies for decades. The establishment of similar institutions is a goal in less established governments to dial down the stakes on elections. It’s not uncommon to have governments where employment is tied to party, tribe, or ethnicity. Not only is merit a secondary concern so the government is run by ill suited employees, but each election is a high stakes battle for the employment status of a good chunk of the population. A healthy civil service sidesteps all of this.