The European Union is facing fresh turmoil as Italy’s prime minister Matteo Renzi announced his resignation after suffering a decisive defeat in his constitutional reform referendum.

Ninety minutes after polls closed, the 41-year premier conceded defeat as exit polls suggested 57% of voters had rejected his plan to streamline the country’s system of government.

Financial markets were braced for fresh volatility amid fears his fall could spark a run on Italy’s tottering banks, further weakening the euro.

The result will be seen as a further victory for the anti-establishment backlash sweeping much of Europe and America - with the opposition to his plan headed by the anti-euro Beppe Grillo’s populist Five Star Movement.

READ MORE: Scottish economy to slow sharply in 2017, warns think-tank

The comedian-turned politician rode the same wave of discontent which propelled Brexit to victory in the UK and Donald Trump to the White House in the United States.

Mr Renzi had staked all on his reform plan - vowing to resign if it was rejected by voters. But his gamble backfired as it turned the referendum into a vote on his record in office.

In an emotional televised address, he accepted full responsibility for the “extraordinarily clear” defeat and said he would tender his resignation after meeting his cabinet on Monday.

“The experience of my government ends here,” he said.

Earlier there was a rare moment of relief for Europe’s beleaguered political mainstream as the challenge of Austria’s far-right Freedom Party for the Austrian presidency ended in failure.

Norbert Hofer, who was seeking to become the first far-right president in Europe since the Second World War was beaten by the Green Party’s Alexander Van der Bellen.

Mr Van der Bellen said his win sent a “message to the capitals of the European Union that one can win elections with high European positions”.

But Marine Le Pen, the leader of France’s National Front, who is hoping to ride the populist tide to victory in the French presidential elections, praised Mr Hofer’s party for a campaign “fought with courage”.

“Victory will be theirs in the next legislative elections,” she said on Twitter.</s>Vienna (AFP) - Austria's voters have resoundingly rejected anti-immigration and eurosceptic Norbert Hofer's bid to become the European Union's first far-right president, a result greeted with relief from centrist politicians across the continent.

Instead, Greens-backed independent candidate Alexander Van der Bellen swept 53.3 percent of Sunday's vote against 46.7 percent for his rival from the anti-immigration Freedom Party (FPOe), according to public television projections.

"Today it is not an exaggeration if I say that today we see a red-white-red -- the flag of Austria -- as a signal of hope and change. A red-white-red signal from Austria to all the capitals of the European Union," Van der Bellen, 72, said in Vienna.

The official result of what has been an ugly and polarising election in normally peaceable Austria, lasting 11 months, was not expected until Monday. But on Sunday an "incredibly sad" Hofer conceded defeat.

"I congratulate Alexander Van der Bellen on his success and call on all Austrians to stick together and work together," Hofer said on Facebook.

Establishment politicians in Austria and Europe had been nervous about a possible Hofer victory in a year that has seen two monumental political upsets already: Donald Trump winning the US presidential election and Britain deciding to leave the EU.

It came shortly before exit polls suggested Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi had lost a high-stakes constitutional referendum also held Sunday -- following a "No" campaign spearheaded by the populist Five Star Movement -- on which he has staked his job.

Hofer, like Trump and "Brexit" proponents, had stoked concerns about immigration and globalisation, vowing to "get rid of the dusty establishment", seek closer ties with Russia and fight against "Brussels centralising power".

Following the arrival of a record number of migrants last year including many fleeing war in Syria, Hofer had also declared that Islam has "no place in Austria", seeing Muslims as a danger to the country's values, traditions and security.

- 'Good omen' -

Story continues

The role of the Austrian president is largely ceremonial, but there had been fears that a Hofer victory would embolden other anti-establishment forces ahead of elections next year in France, Germany and the Netherlands.

The relief across Europe was palpable on Sunday evening, with German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier calling the outcome a "good omen against populism in Europe".

Van der Bellen's "victory is a heavy defeat of nationalism and anti-European, backward-looking populism," said European Parliament president Martin Schulz in a tweet.

"The Austrian people have chosen Europe and open-mindedness," said French President Francois Hollande.

Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras said Van der Bellen's victory was "a breath of fresh air in times when Europe is threatened by the rise of the far-right".

And at Van der Bellen's election party his supporters were pleasantly surprised, many having thought that Trump and Brexit would boost Hofer's chances and fearing voter fatigue.

"It was all worth it. Later I think I might cry out of relief," said social worker Christoph Krottmayer, 35.

At FPOe headquarters there was deep disappointment that the "elite" had won yet again. Several people including Hofer's young daughter burst into tears after the results emerged.

"It's clear that nothing will change in Austria because with Van der Bellen the two main parties can continue without being challenged," FPOe lawmaker Johannes Huebner, 60, told AFP.

Many Hofer voters turned to the internet, where the FPOe has a huge following, to vent their anger.

"I am really thinking about leaving this country for good," bemoaned Manfred Stadler on FPOe leader Heinz-Christian Strache's Facebook page.

"I can predict that pretty soon we will be betrayed by the EU and overrun by radical refugees. I can't be bothered wasting my energy and my money," Stadler said.

- What next for the far-right? -

Marine Le Pen of France's far-right National Front, who visited Hofer earlier this year, congratulated him for "fighting bravely" and said the FPOe would win the next general elections.

The prediction may not be wide of the mark, with the FPOe currently leading opinion polls, stealing voters from the two centrist parties in Chancellor Christian Kern's unhappy "grand coalition".

The two parties, which were forced to watch the presidential election from the sidelines after their candidates were knocked out in April's first round, may even throw in the towel before the government's term ends in late 2018.

But political analyst Peter Hajek, while expecting early elections, was not so sure the FPOe would emerge triumphant. "Anything is possible. They might come first, or they might come third," he told AFP.</s>One step back. One step forward. An Italian tarantella and a Viennese waltz combined in the latest round of Europe’s “Strictly Coming Apart” – but is it Austria or Rome which is out of step here?

Sunday’s No on Prime Minister Matteo Renzi’s constitutional reform, and the defeat of far-right Norbert Hofer in Austria’s rerun presidential are being read as indicators of the supposedly irresistible march of far-right populist/anti-establishment politics in the wake of Brexit and Trump. Austria’s vote suggests the momentum may be beginning to stall, while Italy’s, that there is still a fair wind for it.

With French and German elections scheduled for next year, and possibly Italian elections, in all of which the far-right parties will play a key role, could this runaway train even yet put the future viability of the EU in doubt?

And yet it has been a feature of the rise of populism across the continent that, although strong, it is manifest in very different political forms . Not least on the future of the EU.

Hofer’s Freedom Party, established by ex-Nazis, is sceptical of Europe, but he has stopped well short of calling for Austria to leave the EU and has refered to what he said was Britain’s “tragic” vote to leave. He was also backed by most of the strongly pro-EU conservative People’s Party.

While Italians in the referendum may have embraced the strong anti-Renzi message of Eurosceptic Bepe Grillo’s Five Star Movement and of the far-right Northern League, it is unlikely either party, even after a successful election, would produce a majority for a referendum on euro membership, let alone see it passed. Both, however, were yesterday demanding elections, confidently predicting they will be in the next government.

Renzi’s mistake was not so much to propose overambitious constitutional reform – Grillo promises the same – but to stake his own fate on an unnecessary poll. Like Irish politicians he is learning that voters are capable of voting in referendums on any issue preoccupying them rather than that on the ballot paper.

But that message is sinking in: “The ‘no’ won in an incredibly clear way,” Renzi said yesterday, letting off a broadside at the EU and German-imposed economic austerity. But it is a message that EU leaders would do well to heed – turning the populist tide will not be achieved simply by waiting for it to pass.

But it is important not to overstate the likely impact of Sunday’s polls. Arguably, Italian politics have simply returned to their default position of instability, legislative gridlock, and inability to reform – and that, after all is an Italy we have all lived with since the second World War.

The markets fell yesterday, then rose again, unsurprised by the result. There is pressure on the banks, looking to raise around €20 billion in coming months – recapitalisation may more difficult, but the challenge is little different to that before the vote.</s>VIENNA (Reuters) - Austrian voters roundly rejected on Sunday a candidate vying to become the first freely elected far-right head of state in Europe since World War Two, halting at least temporarily the wave of populism sweeping Western democracies.

The runoff vote was a litmus test, since it was a re-run of a vote held in May, before Britain voted to leave the European Union and Americans elected Donald Trump as president.

Norbert Hofer of the anti-immigration Freedom Party lost the May election by less than a percentage point, and polls had for months shown the race too close to call.

But within minutes of polls closing it was clear he had lost to former Greens leader Alexander Van der Bellen, who had put the June Brexit referendum at the center of his campaign, saying Hofer would lead Austria down the same road as Britain and warning voters not to “play with this fire”.

“A red, white and red signal of hope and of positive change is being beamed from Vienna through Europe,” Van der Bellen said in a victory speech, referring to the colors on Austria’s flag. “I will be a pro-European president of Austria open to the world.”

With only postal ballots left to count, a projection by pollster SORA for broadcaster ORF showed Van der Bellen on 53.3 percent and Hofer on 46.7 percent with a margin of error of 0.4 percentage points.

Turnout was roughly a percentage point higher than in May, at 74 percent. That election had to be re-run because of irregularities in counting the votes.

The result dealt a blow to populists who had hoped anti-establishment anger had grown enough since the Brexit referendum and Trump’s triumph to sweep Hofer into office. The closely watched vote also came before elections in France, Germany and the Netherlands next year.

European governments breathed a sigh of relief at the result, as they had done after the May runoff.

“A weight has fallen from all of Europe’s shoulders,” said German Vice Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel, a Social Democrat. “If the projections are confirmed, the result of the election in Austria is a clear victory for reason against right-wing populism.”

What effect the Brexit and Trump votes had on the Austrian election is not clear.

Data from SORA showed that Van der Bellen’s pro-European stance was his supporters’ second-strongest reason for voting for him, cited by 65 percent of them, just behind the view that he would best represent Austria abroad.

Among Hofer supporters, the top reason was that he “understands the concerns of people like me”, cited by 55 percent of respondents.

Austrian presidential candidate Alexander Van der Bellen, who is supported by the Greens, reacts at an election party in Vienna, Austria, December 4, 2016. REUTERS/Leonhard Foeger

‘INFINITELY SAD’

With one blow to Europe’s political establishment averted, a potentially bigger one looms. Italy is holding a referendum on Sunday on constitutional reform that could decide the political future of Prime Minister Matteo Renzi, who has promised to resign if he loses.

There is also the more distant prospect of a clash between Van der Bellen and the Freedom Party - the FPO - in the event of an FPO victory in parliamentary elections. The president plays an important role in the formation of coalitions after an election, and Van der Bellen has said he would try to prevent an FPO-led government.

“I am infinitely sad that it didn’t work out,” Hofer said on his Facebook page less than an hour after polls closed, later adding that he would run again in the presidential election in six years.

He said he would now turn his attention to running for parliament in an election due by 2018. Polls suggest the FPO would win that election, since it now has the support of roughly a third of voters, well clear of its nearest rival.

“Congratulations to the FPO, which fought valiantly. The next legislative elections will show their victory!” tweeted Marine Le Pen of France’s National Front, an FPO ally who will contest the French presidential election next year.

Austria has for decades been dominated by two centrist parties that are once again in coalition, and anger at that entrenched duopoly has fueled support for the FPO, which wants to end the two parties’ grip on power.

There has been speculation about whether Chancellor Christian Kern’s Social Democrats and the conservative People’s Party will manage to keep working together until their mandate expires in 2018.

“I don’t think this government will last much longer,” Hofer said.

Slideshow (12 Images)

For now Austrians will be glad to put behind them the comedy of errors that meant this election dragged on for almost a year, prompting some media to label the country a “banana republic”.

The result of the May 22 runoff was overturned mostly due to election officials cutting corners as they raced to complete the count. The re-run was then postponed because the glue on the envelopes for some postal ballots did not stick.</s>Robert Austin teaches at the Munk School of Global Affairs, University of Toronto.

As Austrians predictably packed Christmas markets, they less predictably bucked a trend on Sunday by rejecting a far-right populist presidential candidate and electing a left-wing former Green Party leader to be the country’s next president. Many European Union leaders, especially in Western Europe where populists seem to dictate the agenda, could claim a modest victory. The election was a rerun of a contested result in May where the left won by a mere 30,000 votes. This time around, the left’s victory was far more decisive with a turnout of more than 70 per cent.

Austrians, who until now hardly gave much thought to presidential elections, were likely fed up with an often bitter campaign that lasted almost a year. Things got so bad that the normally staid debates resembled the Clinton vs. Trump dust-ups. Austrians did not have great choices either for the largely ceremonial role of president. The contest was between Norbert Hofer, the 45-year-old second in command of the far-right Freedom Party or Alexander Van der Bellen, the 72-year-old former Green Party leader who ran as an independent but was backed by the Greens.

Mr. Hofer came across as down-to-earth and friendly, a wolf in sheep’s clothing many said, and Mr. Van der Bellen was the more detached and austere former professor of economics. In essence, a choice between two extremes as Austria’s traditional governing parties collapsed in the first round of voting. Both the centre-left Social Democrats and the centre-right People’s Party urged their supporters to vote for Mr. Van der Bellen to prevent Austria from electing the first far-right president since the Second World War.

Analysis: Voters in Austria flock to polls to reject far-right candidate

Read more: Far-right camp concedes defeat to Van der Bellen in Austrian presidential election

Read more: Germany and Canada are the West’s last safe harbours

The messages of the two leaders were starkly different. Mr. Hofer sounded the same as other like-minded party leaders in Europe – Marine Le Pen in France or Viktor Orban in Hungary – anti-immigration with some very ominous warnings. The usual stuff – some very real grievances focused on living standards along with some manufactured ones. Fear remained their principal currency.

Mr. Hofer promised a return to the real Austria – one where Austrian values took precedence and an almost imagined past of Austrian homogeneity returned. Freedom Party leader Heinz-Christian Strache, who is more of a street fighter than Mr. Hofer, called German Chancellor Angela Merkel “the most dangerous woman in Europe.” He also warned that continued immigration could provoke a civil war.

Mr. Strache’s civil war allusion prompted an 89-year-old Austrian Holocaust survivor to post a video that went viral. She decried Mr. Strache’s comments and urged particularly young voters to get out and vote. As to civil war, growing up in the Austria of the 1930s unlike Mr. Strache, she had already been through that and said there were ominous signs of history repeating itself.

Clearly, more than a few Austrians decided she may have been right. Besides, with borders under control now (read closed) and no party offering an open door, migration was no longer the mobilizing force it used to be.

Mr. Van der Bellen offered pragmatism, bridge-building between the major parties and a better international image for Austria. After all, the last time the Freedom Party was in a coalition government in 2000, the European Union responded with sanctions of a sort.

Unlike Mr. Hofer, Mr. Van der Bellen never questioned Austria’s loyalty to the EU. Mr. Van der Bellen did well in Austria’s west, its main cities and among the youth and more educated. The Freedom Party found support among males over all along with rural and less affluent regions.

While Mr. Van der Bellen’s victory gives some hope that at least in one country the populist insurgency has been slowed, the Freedom Party is far from finished. It has changed since the days of the neo-Nazism of the late Joerg Haider. It is more nuanced now. Its leaders say they are centre-right, not far right.

One thing is sure, they are not on the periphery. They do well in elections, with more than 20 per cent nationally. They are long part of the Austrian political landscape and the next nationwide elections, which decide real power, may offer another chance for them to remake Austria in 2018.</s>Presidential candidate Alexander Van der Bellen, a former leading member of the Greens Party, celebrates on the podium at a party of his supporters in Austria's capital Vienna Sunday, Dec. 4, 2016, after the first official results from the Austrian presidential election showed left-leaning candidate Alexander Van der Bellen with what appears to be an unbeatable lead over right-winger Norbert Hofer. (AP Photo/Matthias Schrader)

VIENNA (AP) — Left-leaning Alexander Van der Bellen triumphed over his right-wing rival Sunday in the vote for Austria's presidency, a victory welcomed by moderate politicians across Europe as a blow against the populist forces looking to weaken the European Union.

While the Austrian presidency is a mostly symbolic post, it had attracted attention from across Europe as the next possible victory for populists after political outsider Donald Trump's presidential win in the United States and the Brexit vote in Britain.

"What happens here today has relevance for all of Europe," Van der Bellen said he cast his ballot, later noting that his win showed most voters backed his message of "freedom, equality, solidarity."

With all votes except for absentee ballots counted, Van der Bellen had 51.68 percent of the vote to 48.32 percent for Norbert Hofer. But pollsters predicted a final result of 53.3 percent to 46.7 percent in favor of Van der Bellen once the approximately 500,000 absentee ballots were tallied. The final result of Sunday's vote was expected by Tuesday at the latest.

Van der Bellen said the win sends a "message to the capitals of the European Union that one can win elections with high European positions." He said he would work to unite a country deeply split between the moderate liberals who voted for him and supporters of Hofer's anti-immigrant Freedom Party.

Powerful euroskeptic populist politicians facing elections next year in other EU nations shrugged off Hofer's loss as a temporary setback, but the result was greeted with relief and congratulations by mainstream politicians.

French President Francois Hollande said Austrians "made the choice of Europe, and openness." Vice Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel, who heads Germany's center-left Social Democrats, told the Bild newspaper that "a load has been taken off the mind of all of Europe." He called the result "a clear victory for good sense against right-wing populism."

Austrian Chancellor Christian Kern said Van der Bellen "will represent Austria domestically and abroad in an excellent manner" — alluding to fears by establishment politicians that a victory by Hofer, whose anti-immigrant Freedom Party is critical of the 28-nation EU, would hurt Austria's image. Van der Bellen is liberal, left-of-center and pro-EU.

Martin Schulz, the president of the European Parliament, called the victory a defeat for "anti-European, backward-looking populism."

With polls estimating that the two candidates were neck-and-neck ahead of the vote, Van der Bellen's margin of victory was unexpected.

Political scientist Kathrin Stainer Haemmerle told the Austria Press Agency said that despite widespread disenchantment with establishment parties in Austria, the results show "the majority of the population is not looking for radical change."

Still, Van der Bellen's victory presages new possible divisions.

The new Austrian president-elect has said he would refuse to swear in a government led by the Freedom Party. But with the Freedom Party given a good chance of winning the parliamentary election less than two years away, Van der Bellen might be forced to act on that pledge. If he is true to his word, he would plunge Austria into a political crisis with unforeseen consequences.

Hofer, meanwhile, conceded his loss in a Facebook posting. Acknowledging that he was "endlessly sad," Hofer said "I would have been happy to take care of our Austria." He urged voters of both camps to bury their differences and work together.

Appearing later with Van der Bellen, Hofer said his loss "is really very painful ... but the voter is always right in a democracy."

Far-right National Front leader Marine Le Pen of France and anti-immigrant politician Geert Wilders in the Netherlands tweeted their support for Hofer as voting took place Sunday, then later made the best of his loss. The two, who both face their own national elections next year, congratulated Hofer on his strong showing.

Le Pen, who hopes to ride anti-immigrant, anti-EU sentiment to the French presidency, tweeted that Hofer and his Freedom Party "fought with courage."

"Victory will be theirs in the next legislative election!" she added.

Congratulating Van der Bellen, EU Council President Donald Tusk said "the continued constructive contribution of Austria to finding common European solutions and keeping our European unity will remain essential."</s>VIENNA – The Latest on Austria's presidential election (all times local):

Left-leaning candidate Alexander Van der Bellen says that the presidential election he hopes to win has meaning well beyond Austria.

Van der Bellen is running against right-wing populist Norbert Hofer. The results are seen as a barometer of how well other euroskeptic candidates like Hofer will do elsewhere in the EU in national elections next year.

He said as he cast his ballot that "what happens here today has relevance for all of Europe."

The election is a rerun from May, which Van der Bellen narrowly won. It is being re-held following a court ruling after Hofer's Freedom Party claimed widespread irregularities.

Van der Bellen also expressed hope that Italian Premier Matteo Renzi wins a referendum on constitutional reforms that will be decisive for Renzi's political future.

As Austrians start casting ballots for president, their comments reflect a tight race between left-leaning Alexander Van der Bellen and right-wing populist Norbert Hofer.

Guenther Poiker is unequivocal, saying outside of a Vienna polling station "I'm a Van der Bellen voter." But Alexander Mautner figures that "Hofer is going to win, by a very small margin."

The election is a rerun from May, which Van der Bellen won by less than 1 percentage point. It is being re-held following a court ruling after Hofer's Freedom Party claimed widespread irregularities.

Austria's presidency is a mostly ceremonial post. But the election is being watched as a barometer of how populists in other European Union countries may fare in coming months.

In an election sure to reverberate across Europe, Austrian voters are choosing between a right-wing populist and a left-leaning former politician for their next president.

Austria's presidency is a mostly ceremonial post. But the Sunday election is being watched as a barometer of how populists in other European Union countries may fare in coming months.

The Austrian vote pits Alexander Van der Bellen against Norbert Hofer. A former leading member of the Greens Party, Van der Bellen is the hope of Austrians who want to stop Hofer, a popular leader of the anti-migrant and anti-EU Freedom Party.

Most polling stations opened at 7 a.m. and will close at 5 p.m. local time. Results are expected late Sunday, but the winner may not be known until absentee ballots are counted on Monday.</s>Austria will provide a new gauge of the populist wave sweeping Western democracies on Sunday, as the divided country holds a vote that could deliver the first freely-elected far-right head of state in Europe since World War Two.

The knife-edge presidential run-off is all the more dramatic for being a re-run of an election held six months ago - before Britain chose to leave the European Union and Americans elected Donald Trump as president.

It will offer an indication of whether popular anger at the political establishment has grown.

Voters have a choice between two men with very different ideas about Austria’s future. One candidate is Alexander Van der Bellen, a 72-year-old Green Party leader who wants Austria to remain a liberal, open, pro-European Union country.

On the other hand is Norbert Hofer, the 45-year-old candidate of the far-right Freedom Party (FPÖ).

Hofer has run an anti-establishment, Eurosceptic, “Austria first” campaign that he hopes will hand him the keys to the Hofburg Palace and make him postwar Europe’s first far-right populist head of state.

When Hofer narrowly lost the original run-off in May with 49.65 per cent of the vote, European governments breathed a sigh of relief.

Far-right parties like France’s National Front, however, cheered the record performance.

Opinion polls suggest the race remains too close to call and could again come down to postal ballots, meaning the final result might come as late as Tuesday.

The first projections are due shortly after polling stations close at 5 pm (4pm GMT).

What influence Trump and Brexit have had on Austria is unclear, but the fault lines are similar - blue-collar workers have largely backed Hofer, the highly educated favour his opponent, former Greens leader Alexander Van der Bellen.

Van der Bellen (72) has put Brexit at the heart of his campaign, arguing that Hofer wants Austria to hold its own “Oexit” referendum, putting jobs at risk in the small, trade-dependent country.

“Let us not play with this fire. Let us not play with Oexit,” Van der Bellen said in their last televised debate, referring to the fact Hofer initially said Austria could hold its own referendum within a year before backing down.

A Hofer win would raise the prospect of two near-simultaneous blows to Europe’s political establishment.

Italy is holding a referendum on Sunday on constitutional reform that polls suggest Prime Minister Matteo Renzi will lose.

Austria’s president traditionally has a largely ceremonial role, but Hofer has made clear he wants to be an interventionist head of state, threatening to dismiss a government if it raises taxes and calling for referendums on a range of issues, even though referendums are beyond the job’s remit.

“You will be amazed at what will be possible,” Hofer (45) said in April when asked about the president’s powers.

The president also plays an important part in forming coalitions.

Van der Bellen has said he would try to prevent an FPO-led government even if it won an election.

The FPO is running first in polls with support of roughly a third of voters, with parliamentary elections due in 2018.

Austria has for decades been dominated by two centrist parties that are once again in coalition, and anger at that entrenched duopoly has fuelled support for the far-right FPO, which says it wants to end the two parties’ grip on power.

The country, which stretches from Slovakia to Switzerland and borders Germany, was swept up in Europe’s migration crisis last year, stoking unease among many voters already concerned about globalisation and rising unemployment, playing into the FPO’s hands.

Whatever the outcome, weary Austrian voters hope it will at least bring to an end an election that has dragged on for almost a year after a comedy of errors that prompted some Austrian media to call the country a “banana republic”.

The result of the May 22nd run-off was overturned because of irregularities in the count of postal ballots, mostly due to election officials cutting corners as they raced to complete the count.

The re-run was then postponed because the glue on the envelopes for some postal ballots did not stick.

Officials are this time aiming to do everything by the book, in the hope that a small delay to the result prevents bigger problems down the line.</s>Call it the Donald Trump effect, just not the one that pundits expected.

Austria had long been identified as the next beach that could be washed over by the populist tide that had already this year carried Mr. Trump to the White House, and the United Kingdom toward exit from the European Union. Most opinion polls ahead of Sunday’s election suggested Austrians were ready to join the anti-establishment revolt and choose far-right politician Norbert Hofer as their next president.

Voters in Italy – where Prime Minister Matteo Renzi was handed a resounding defeat in Sunday’s referendum on proposed constitutional changes, leading to his resignation – did indeed follow the script. But Austrians appear to have drawn a different inspiration from Mr. Trump’s election. They went to the polls in unexpectedly large numbers on Sunday to reject Mr. Hofer, and to hand a narrow victory to his left-of-centre opponent, Alexander Van der Bellen.

Read more: Far-right camp concedes defeat to Van der Bellen in Austrian presidential election

Read more: Germany and Canada are the West’s last safe harbours

Official results showed Mr. Van der Bellen ahead with 51.6 per cent of the vote, versus 48.3 per cent for Mr. Hofer. That margin was expected to widen as absentee ballots were counted. One projection suggested Mr. Van der Bellen would win 53.3 per cent of the final tally, and Mr. Hofer quickly conceded defeat.

Turnout looked to be in the range of 75 per cent, bucking a two-decade-long trend of declining voter participation.

“People [felt they] should vote otherwise they would wake up with Trump or Brexit,” Peter Hajek, a Vienna-based pollster, told The Globe and Mail.

Mr. Van der Bellen, a former Green Party leader, actually won a May contest between the two men by an even slimmer margin – winning 50.3 per cent of the vote – before the country’s Constitutional Court annulled that result on a technicality and ordered a nationwide rerun.

After the shocks of the Brexit vote and Mr. Trump’s victory, there were widespread predictions that Mr. Hofer, whose Freedom Party was founded by ex-Nazi officers in the wake of the Second World War, would deliver the next big shock to Western politics. His campaign slogan of “Austria first!” echoed Mr. Trump’s own call to “Make America great again.”

While Austria’s presidency has traditionally been a ceremonial post, Mr. Hofer made it clear he planned to do more than simply attend diplomatic functions. He suggested he would have fired the government over its handling of the 2015 refugee crisis – when hundreds of thousands of refugees and other migrants entered Austria – if he had been in office.

In a September interview with The Globe and Mail, the 45-year-old Mr. Hofer denied any connection to Nazism, but said he wanted to ban the head-to-toe burka worn by some conservative Muslim women. He also said that, if elected, he would look at options for sending many of the recently arrived asylum-seekers back to their home countries.

But after a nearly year-long election campaign, he stepped aside gracefully once the result became clear on Sunday. “I am infinitely sad that it did not work out. I would gladly have taken care of our Austria,” he wrote on his Facebook page shortly after polls closed. Mr. Hofer called on his supporters to back Mr. Van der Bellen, and for “all Austrians to stick together and to work together.”

Freedom Party Leader Heinz-Christian Strache told Austrian television that there would be no legal challenge of the result this time. “There are no complaints … Today we can be sure that citizens’ votes were properly handled,” he said.

Mr. Van der Bellen – who ran as an independent and used fears of Brexit and Mr. Trump’s win to mobilize his own voter base – said his victory was proof that a politician could run on “European” ideals and win.

“A red-white-and-red signal of hope and of positive change is being beamed from Vienna through Europe,” the 72-year-old said in a victory speech, referring to the colours of Austria’s flag. “I will be a pro-European president of Austria open to the world.”

The result was indeed greeted with relief around the continent. Martin Schulz, the president of the European Parliament in Brussels, said the Austrian result was “a heavy defeat of nationalism and anti-European, backward-looking populism.”

Ulrich Kelber, Germany’s deputy justice minister, wrote on his Twitter account that “perhaps Trump’s election was the turning point. The liberal majority pushes back.”

That is yet to be seen. While Mr. Van der Bellen’s win will calm fears that Europe’s political establishment is set to fall like a row of dominoes, the threat of more political instability remains very real.

Key elections also loom large for the Netherlands, France and Germany in the months ahead.

In the Netherlands, the far-right Party of Freedom, which has vowed to close all Islamic schools and mosques, and to pull the country out of the EU, leads most opinion polls ahead of parliamentary elections set for March.

In France, it’s expected that no candidate will win the requisite 50 per cent of the vote in the April 23 first round of presidential elections. That would trigger a second-round showdown, with the two most likely candidates being François Fillon, the arch conservative recently chosen as the Republican candidate, and Marine Le Pen, the firebrand leader of the far-right Front National.

Even Austria’s political direction is far from clear, despite Sunday’s result.

Mr. Hofer’s strong showing has the Freedom Party well-positioned to challenge for power – and the more powerful chancellor’s post – in parliamentary elections scheduled for 2018.</s>Hofer's announcement puts Alexander Van der Bellen in the clear to assume the presidency. Official results are not expected until late Sunday or early Monday, but exit polls announced by state broadcaster ORF showed Van der Bellen with 53.6% of the vote.

While the Austrian president's role is largely ceremonial, the vote was closely watched around the world as a gauge of wider anti-establishment sentiment following the election of US President-elect Donald Trump and Britain's vote in June to leave the European Union.

"I am incredibly sad it didn't work out," Hofer wrote in a concession statement on Facebook.

"I would have loved to look after Austria. I congratulate Alexander Van der Bellen to his success and ask all Austrians to stick together," he added. "We are all Austrians, no matter what we decided today. Long live our home Austria."

Van der Bellen spoke on Austrian state TV, crediting his apparent victory to "the engagement of hundreds of thousands" of people. "That's how a big movement developed. I have always campaigned for a pro-European Austria. This is about values: freedom, equality and solidarity. Also to include those that don't do that well in the current economic system," he said. "I will actively speak to all voters, including those of Hofer's party. They have real concerns that have to be taken seriously by the president." Van der Bellen's apparent win marks a significant change to Austria's political landscape, which has been dominated by two centrist parties since the end of the war. The original presidential vote was held in May, with Van der Bellen, a former Green Party leader, defeating Hofer by little more than 30,000 votes in a tightly fought contest decided by mail-in ballots. But the results were challenged by Hofer and his party, and were eventually annulled over concerns about how some ballots were handled Alexander Van der Bellen supporters hold a sign readig "Thank God" as exit polls come in on Sunday. A win for Hofer would have made Austria the first nation with a far-right head of state in Western Europe since the end of World War II. The leader of France's far-right National Front, Marine Le Pen, congratulated Hofer's Freedom Party for a fighting "with courage." "The next legislative elections will be their victory," she said on Twitter. Austrian Chancellor Christian Kern said on Twitter that he had congratulated Van der Bellen in person. "It's a good day for Austria. Now we have to work together to make sure no one sees themselves as a loser," he said. Van der Bellen, a 72-year-old economist whose parents spent time in a refugee camp before settling in Austria, has championed liberal migration policies. Holocaust survivor in Austria makes plea: don't let far right win Freedom Party win presidential election He is an outspoken supporter of gay marriage, and despite his age, he has young fans who organized dance raves in his support. In contrast, Hofer's party had risen on a populist groundswell sweeping the continent caused by the European Union's failure to make progress in the ongoing economic and migrant crises. On Sunday, after casting his ballot, Van der Bellen said the Austrian election was "of significance for all of Europe." Europe follows Trump to the right (Opinion) "Outside of Austria, the election is perceived as something that does not only concern us Austrians," he said. which was later annulled, Van der Bellen told CNN's Christiane Amanpour that Europe "shouldn't dramatize" the growing popularity of far-right parties in Europe. which was later annulled, Van der Bellen told CNN's Christiane Amanpour that Europe "shouldn't dramatize" the growing popularity of far-right parties in Europe. Following his victory in May, which was later annulled, Van der Bellen told CNN's Christiane Amanpour that Europe "shouldn't dramatize" the growing popularity of far-right parties in Europe. There were concerns in Brussels that Austria was on track to become the next "euroskeptic" state, with Hofer indicating support early in his campaign for a referendum, like Britain's "Brexit" vote, on the country's membership in the EU. But Hofer softened his position on the EU, saying he preferred to stay in a reformed decentralized union.
Voters in Austria go to the polls to elect a new President in a second round run-off between Green candidate Alexander Van der Bellen and Freedom Party of Austria candidate Norbert Hofer. Projections show that Van der Bellen has won with Hofer conceding defeat.