The unprecedented electoral success of France’s far-right National Rally (RN) in June’s parliamentary elections carries with it opportunities but also risks for the party. With 89 MPs – 11 times the number of seats it won in the 2017 election – the RN is now the single largest opposition faction. The election of two parliamentary vice-speakers from the party known for anti-immigrant, Eurosceptic views symbolises the RN’s triumphant entry into France’s political institutions and what some allies of its leader, Marine Le Pen, such as Louis Aliot, hail as the “shattering of the [electoral] glass ceiling” it had long faced.
Yet Le Pen’s party, accustomed to making blistering rhetorical attacks on the government but with almost no experience of wielding power, will need to adapt to working within democratic institutions. The stakes are high. If the RN is able to prove to voters that it can be a responsible political actor in parliament, it will be further legitimised and will be one step closer to its goal of gaining power nationally.
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