The second round of the French presidential election was held on Sunday. Here is the result:

François Hollande (Socialist) – 51.68%
Nicolas Sarkozy (UMP – right) – 48.32%

So, François Hollande becomes only the second socialist after François Mitterrand to be elected as president under the Fifth Republic (1958-). He is the first socialist president to be elected since 1988. Nicolas Sarkozy becomes the second incumbent president to fail to be re-elected. The first was Valéry Giscard d’Estaing in 1981.

The key test is now the legislative election. These will take place on 10 and 17 June. When legislative elections have closely followed presidential elections, they have usually generated a large presidential majority. This was the case in 1981, 2002 and 2007. However, in 1988 the Socialists enjoyed only a plurality, falling a handful of seats short of an absolute majority.

This time, the Socialists can expect to win a majority in conjunction with the Greens, with whom they had already agreed a deal on seats at the legislative election prior to the presidential election. There is also the possibility that supporters of the Left Front candidate, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, may be part of a coalition. However, no deal has been agreed with them and mutual désistement arrangements may be difficult to agree at this late stage.

Le Monde reports that at the second round of the presidential election Hollande was ahead of Sarkozy in 333 of the 577 legislative constituencies. While this is not a sure-fire indicator that the left will win such a majority in June, they are likely to do so. Indeed, maximising the likelihood that the president would be supported by a legislative majority was the main point of the 2000 constitutional amendment that reduced the length of the presidential term to five years and placed the presidential election before the legislative election.

The main talking point of the legislatives is how many seats the extreme-right National Front (FN) is likely to win. Up to now it has had difficulty winning any seats under the two-ballot plurality system. However, this time it might do so, especially in certain constituencies where there is a ‘triangular’ contest between the left and the UMP. However, I would not put money on them winning very many.

As for the UMP, its very survival is at stake. Sarkozy is unlikely to play a role in the immediate future. Former PM and party grandee, Alain Juppé, has already announced that he will not be standing for election at the legislatives. There has been ongoing rivalry between the PM, François Fillon, and party leader, Jean-François Copé. The party may maintain some semblance of unity prior to the legislatives, but it is unlikely to last. Some of the centrists are already semi-detached. The anti-European right of the party is well organised. In France, right-wing parties tend to be electoral vehicles for presidential candidates. It would not surprise me if the UMP ceased to exist in its current form over the course of the next few years.