Official results were expected on Monday at noon here.

Three groups of election monitors have been deployed, including former President Carter’s organization. But even before the race began, it was marred by charges of unprecedented vote buying. In the most contested districts, there were reports of votes being bought for as much as $2,000, and thousands of expatriates received all-expense-paid trips to Lebanon to vote.

In one district, an ambulance brought hospital patients to the polls to cast ballots.

Lebanon has long been seen as a proxy battlefield for regional and global interests, and so foreign powers from Washington to Tehran have paid close attention. But its politics are also intensely local, with power divided among sect leaders who jealously guard their interests.

On one side is the March 14 coalition, which holds the majority bloc and is led by the Sunni Muslim Future Movement of Saad Hariri, whose father’s assassination in 2005 led to huge protests that forced Syria to withdraw its troops from Lebanon.

On the other side is the March 8 coalition, whose two main members are Hezbollah and the Christian party of Mr. Aoun, the Free Patriotic Movement.

If Hezbollah’s alliance had emerged victorious, it would have represented another step in the evolution of a once parochial Shiite militia that started as a guerrilla force fighting Israeli occupation of the south into a national institution that slowly has defined the identity of the state.

Hezbollah has said that it would work to build what it called a “culture of resistance,” and define the enemy of Lebanon as Israel and the United States. It also said it would make it a high priority to build a strong national military.

Instead, it is the March 14 group that appears to find itself having won greater legitimacy. When Mr. Hariri’s alliance first won in 2005, it did so as part of an alliance with Hezbollah. The two camps broke ties shortly after the election and for years since Hezbollah said that March 14 would not have had the majority if not for its help, and therefore represented an illegitimate government.