Political leaders need ministers to help them rule and so conventional wisdom suggests that leaders appoint competent ministers to their cabinet.

This book shows this is not necessarily the case. It examines the conditions that facilitate survival in ministerial office and how they are linked to the political survival of heads of government and political institutions. Presenting a new formal theory of political survival in the cabinet, it systematically analyses the tenure in office of more than 7,300 ministers of foreign affairs covering more than 180 countries spanning the years...