John Winston Howard, OM, AC, (born 26 July 1939) was the 25th Prime Minister of Australia, from 11 March 1996 to 3 December 2007. He is the second longest-serving Australian prime minister, after Sir Robert Menzies, who first served from 1939 to 1941 and again from 1949 to 1966. Born in the multicultural Sydney suburb of Earlwood, Howard is the son of a University of Sydney lecturer and a former office worker. He had previously worked as solicitor for twelve years before pursuing a political career in the 1950s.

Howard was a member of the House of Representatives from 1974 to 2007, representing the Division of Bennelong, New South Wales. He served as Treasurer in the Fraser government from 1977 to 1983. He was Leader of the Liberal Party and Coalition Opposition from 1985 to 1989, which included the 1987 federal election against Bob Hawke. He was re-elected as Leader of the Opposition in 1995.

Howard led the Liberal-National coalition to victory at the 1996 federal election, defeating Paul Keating's Labor government and ending a record 13 years of Coalition opposition. The Howard Government was re-elected at the 1998, 2001 and 2004 elections. Major issues for the Howard Government included taxation, industrial relations, immigration, the Iraq war, and Aboriginal relations. Howard's coalition government was defeated at the 2007 election by the Labor Party led by Kevin Rudd. Howard also lost his own parliamentary seat at the election; he was the second Australian prime minister, after Stanley Bruce in 1929, to do so.