Emmanuel Macron's easy win over his far-right rival might look like a triumph of moderation over extremism. With a margin of victory exceeding his campaign's most optimistic projections, it might seem French voters decided to choose hope over fear, to look outward, not inward.
Yet, this election marks the most fundamental realignment of French politics since the beginning of the Fifth Republic in 1958. The traditional alternation of power between centre-left and centre-right presidents has been swept away by something entirely new, and dangerous. The National Front has, as Marine Le Pen noted in conceding defeat, become the country's leading opposition force, no longer just a basket of deplorables agitating on the fringes. It has effectively accomplished its goal of reframing French political debate along the axis of "patriots versus globalists."
It will now fall to Mr. Macron to push back the nationalist tide, nurtured by growing working- and middle-class anger in the face of French economic stagnation. Is he up to the task?
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Never will a French president have come to office with so little experience in government, foreign affairs or, frankly, politics itself. Mr. Macron has defied the odds so far, and will benefit from a groundswell of goodwill from most French voters and world leaders. But others will be gunning for his failure. U.S. President Donald Trump, who all but endorsed Ms. Le Pen, issued a cool two-sentence statement to congratulate Mr. Macron on his victory.
Ms. Le Pen, who ran a well-calibrated campaign until going into the gutter in last week's critical debate against Mr. Macron, won the support of more than one in three of those who cast a valid ballot. She hinted on Sunday that she could rename her party, to broaden its appeal and prepare for the next battle in June's legislative elections. That vote, the decisive round of which will be held on June 18, will determine the makeup of the National Assembly, and with it, Mr. Macron's ability to govern.
The National Front has no chance of winning anwhere close to a plurality of the National Assembly's 577 seats. But there is no doubt the party will have more political influence than ever. It will have an unlikely accomplice in seeking to block Mr. Macron's agenda in far-left Euroskeptic leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon – whose anti-Macron supporters were deemed responsible for the lowest turnout in a presidential election since 1969 (75 per cent) and record rate of spoiled ballots (9 per cent).
Meanwhile, Les Républicains, the centre-right establishment party whose presidential nominee was eliminated in the first round, is currently favoured in the legislative vote and is likely to hew more closely to the National Front's hard line on crime, immigration and terrorism.
The coming days will determine whether Mr. Macron's inchoate political movement, En Marche!, is able to transform (after renaming) itself into a real political party in time to win the legislative vote. A former Socialist economy minister, Mr. Macron is expected to see dozens of legislators from his deeply unpopular former party run under the EM banner he intends to rename. He has also vowed to bring dozens of newcomers into French politics, either as cabinet ministers or National Assembly candidates.
One oft-mentioned potential candidate is Laurence Parisot, the former head of France's big-business lobby, a nomination that could set up tensions with the progressive wing of Mr. Macron's party, but which would send a strong signal regarding the pro-Europe, pro-markets orientation he intends to slap on his government.
Then again, Mr. Macron may not have the luxury of choosing his own prime minister at all. If Les Républicains win the legislative vote, the new President would likely be forced to name François Baroin to the post. This kind of shared-power arrangement between a president from one party and a National Assembly in the hands of another is known in France as "la cohabitation" and it has a history of producing lame-duck presidents. François Mitterand and Jacques Chirac both spent a good part of their presidencies as little more than figureheads as a result.
With that in mind, French voters may want to give their new President the legislature he says he needs to transform the hope inspired by his campaign into the change he says France needs. Because, as the lead-up to Sunday's election proved, rarely has there been so much riding on one French president.
Konrad Yakabuski