According to French pollsters’ projections based on preliminary results, France appears to be heading for a prolonged political stalemate, as no party or coalition has won an absolute majority of parliamentary seats.
Experts suggest the immediate path forward is unclear. The country could face months of political instability, with President Emmanuel Macron facing a deeply divided parliament that includes two blocs staunchly opposed to him.
“Without an absolute majority, the government will be at the mercy of opposition parties that will unite to overthrow it,” said Dominique Rousseau, professor emeritus of public law at the Panthéon-Sorbonne University in Paris.
Projections indicate that the National Assembly, the lower house of the French parliament, will be divided into three main blocs with competing agendas and, in some cases, deep animosity towards each other.
Pollsters’ projections released Sunday night after polls closed in the final round of the legislative election showed a group of left-wing parties called the New Popular Front would win the most seats, followed by Macron’s centrist alliance and the nationalist, anti-immigration Rassemblement National. It was unclear whether the centrists or the right-wing Rassemblement National would be the second-largest bloc.
At the moment, none of the three main blocs appears capable of working with the others. Each could try to form a workable majority with a handful of smaller parties or independent lawmakers to fill the rest of the lower house seats. However, their ability to do so remains uncertain.
“French political culture is not conducive to compromise,” said Samy Benzina, a professor of public law at the University of Poitiers, noting that French institutions are typically designed to produce “clear majorities capable of governing alone.”
A scenario in which no party manages to win an absolute majority, at least 289 of the 577 seats in the lower house, is not unprecedented in France. This is exactly what happened during the last legislative elections in 2022. However, Macron has managed to put together functioning governments that have successfully passed laws over the past two years.
However, this was only because Macron’s centrist coalition was large enough, with around 250 seats, and the parties opposing him were too divided to pose a lasting threat. When they were not, Macron’s government came dangerously close to falling.
This time, Macron’s options appear much more limited.
His centrist coalition cannot govern alone. And few smaller parties, even the more moderate ones on the left or right, are eager to be associated with Macron, who is deeply unpopular and has three years left in his term.
The National Rally has already said it would govern only if it had an absolute majority or just below it and thought it could reach an agreement with enough other lawmakers to close the gap. Marine Le Pen, the party’s longtime leader, told French radio last week that she would not accept “sitting in a ministerial post without being able to do anything,” which she said would be “the worst betrayal” of the party’s voters.
On Sunday, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, leader of one of the parties of the left-wing New Popular Front, said he would not enter into negotiations with Macron’s coalition to form a joint government.
Some analysts and politicians have floated the possibility of a broad “rainbow” coalition of lawmakers, agreeing on a limited number of key issues and stretching from the Greens to the more moderate conservatives. But several political leaders have already ruled that out.
Another possibility is a caretaker government of politically neutral experts to manage day-to-day affairs until there is a political breakthrough. This too would be a departure from French tradition.
France has a robust civil service that could get by for a while without a government. However, the Summer Olympics are just weeks away and Parliament usually passes a budget in the fall. Some analysts believe Macron’s position will become so untenable that he will have to resign, but he has said he will not.