Will Macron's plan work? France's snap election explained

STORY: French politics has been thrown into full campaign mode after president Emmanuel Macron called a snap election.

With polls opening on June 30, the move was a gamble to try to catch other parties off-guard with just a few weeks to prepare.

And came after Marine Le Pen's National Rally (RN) trounced Macron's ruling centrist party in European Parliament elections.

But how will it all play out and will Macron's plan pay off?

:: How does the vote work?

There are 577 constituency contests, one for each seat in the National Assembly.

Candidates with an absolute majority of votes in their constituency are elected in the first round.

But usually a second round is needed to reach this criteria.

To qualify for the run-off, candidates need first-round votes amounting to at least 12.5 percent of registered voters.

The top scorer wins the second round.

:: Who will run the government?

The president will name the prime minister, usually from the party with the most seats.

For the first time in France's post-war history, opinion polls show the far right could win.

Speaking after the snap election announcement, Executive Director of the Centre of Political Sciences at Sciences Po Anne Muxel said this strategy from Macron could backfire.

"It's a play at risks because it opens the possibility that the extreme right arises for the first time at the government and it opens the eventuality to have a cohabitation in France between him, the president of Republic, and the government."

An absolute majority requires at least 289 seats.

National Rally could run a minority government if it wins the most seats without reaching that threshold.

But 28-year-old party leader Jordan Bardella has said it wanted an absolute majority or would not be able to carry out reforms.

:: What could happen next?

"Cohabitation", where the government is of a different political stripe from the president, has occurred in three periods in French history.

The government has most of the power on the domestic front, but the president is the head of the military and wields influence abroad.

The division of power on foreign policy is not clear cut though, and that could be an issue for France's stance on the war in Ukraine or European Union policy.

Macron will have to deal with the new parliament for at least a year, then he could call another snap election.

He won a second mandate in April 2022 and is president for three more years. Neither parliament nor the government can force him out before that.