French parties once united to stop the far right. Will they do it again now?

France finds itself facing unprecedented political uncertainty after the far-right National Rally (RN) party made historic gains in the first round of snap legislative elections Sunday.

Pulling in 33% of the national vote, Marine Le Pen’s party capitalized on fears of immigration, crime, and falling purchasing power to make its strongest-ever showing in a French election. Meanwhile, President Emmanuel Macron’s Renaissance party failed to ignite enthusiasm among his supporters, trailing behind a newly formed left-wing coalition, the New Popular Front (NFP).

Now, as France looks ahead to a second round on July 7, many moderate voters say they fear the RN will win an outright parliamentary majority, obliging Mr. Macron to rule in a “cohabitation” government alongside an opposition prime minister.

Faced with the prospect of an RN government, leaders of the NFP and Mr. Macron’s Renaissance group are each calling on their candidates to stand down in constituencies where the other party has the better chance of beating the RN, pooling the anti-RN vote.

But even if a significant number of politicians respond to that call, it is unclear how voters might respond. The election campaign has been one of the most antagonistic in recent history and the French are more divided than ever. Can they come together in time to block a far-right win?

Twenty years ago, Socialists backed the conservative Jacques Chirac for president against Ms. Le Pen’s father. “The country joined hands against the far right,” says Pierre Bréchon, professor emeritus of political science at Sciences Po Grenoble. But today “the atmosphere in France is very different.”

“The far right is well-established, the major political parties have dissolved, and people are no longer loyal to a single party,” he says. “We’re in uncharted territory.”

“Not one single seat for the RN”

The RN’s star has continued to rise in the last two decades, sharing in a global shift toward more radical policies, such as tightened restrictions on immigration, climate denial, and anti-”woke” sentiment. Italy, Holland, and Hungary have all recently elected far-right leaders, and France’s far right has profited from their success.

“More moderate leaders have not delivered on their promises,” says Oleg Kobtzeff, a professor of history and political science at the American University of Paris. “They’ve taken from the middle classes and not given back. Traditional parties have completely lost credibility. So we can’t just say far-right voters are ‘deplorables’ and leave it at that.”

In 2017, the RN won eight seats in parliament; in 2022, it became the largest opposition party with 89 seats. Some polls suggest that on Sunday it could win 230 seats or more in the 577-seat National Assembly.

Still, the second round remains clouded. Three-way races will be held in as many as 244 constituencies, depending on how many candidates step down and throw their votes to a stronger anti-RN candidate.

The leader of the far-left France Unbowed (LFI) party, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, was unequivocal in his call to halt the RN’s momentum, saying Sunday night, “our directive is clear: not one single vote, not one single seat for the RN.”

But Mr. Mélenchon has spent much of his campaign vilifying Mr. Macron, and his supporters may balk at supporting the president’s party on election day.

And while Prime Minister Gabriel Attal called on Renaissance party candidates to step out of the race to block the RN, other senior members of his coalition have refused to advise its supporters to vote for the left-wing bloc if its candidate belongs to the anti-capitalist LFI.

“This blurs the message for voters, and those who want to oppose the RN will be confused,” says Célia Belin, a senior policy fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations in Paris. “Ultimately, it has a demobilizing effect. If people don’t like the choices before them, they might just decide not to vote at all. And not voting helps the RN win big.”

“It doesn’t look good”

France’s two-round voting system has historically benefited the party leading after the first round, and some analysts suggest that the RN could win as much as half the vote on Sunday. The party would need 289 seats to win an outright majority, in which case Mr. Macron would be obliged to appoint Jordan Bardella, the RN president, as prime minister.

The alternative, says Dr. Belin, would be a hung parliament, in which no party gains an absolute majority.

“In that case, we could see a coalition” of moderate parties uniting around a prime minister other than Mr. Bardella, Dr. Belin suggests. “But I don’t necessarily believe in it. I think we’d see votes of no confidence at every turn. I can’t predict the future, but it doesn’t look good.”

Still, some observers say there is time to turn the situation around and bring the public together against the far right, partly because the situation in France is not necessarily as grim as far-right leaders make it out to be.

“The reality of France as a whole is not that bad,” says Douglas Webber, professor emeritus of political science at INSEAD, a business school. “We’ve reduced the level of unemployment, advanced France’s agenda in Europe, and gotten through the COVID crisis.”

The far right has nevertheless capitalized on everyday fears such as terrorism, immigration, and the cost of living crisis and, says Dr. Webber, and the National Rally enjoys one major advantage: having never been in power, it cannot be blamed for the current state of affairs.

“In the last 30 years, France has tried the moderate right and the moderate left,” says Dr. Webber. “They haven’t tried … the far right.”

Despite the doubt, one thing is clear. Voters will turn out en masse for the second round. The first-round vote saw exceptionally high voter participation: at 67%, the highest since 1981.

That gave Mr. Macron one justification for his decision to dissolve parliament and call snap elections, a choice widely criticized for the uncertainty into which he has thrown the country.

“The high participation during the first round,” he said Sunday evening, “is testimony to the importance of this vote for all citizens, and to the necessity of clarifying the political situation.”