English

Alternative forms

• iron-handed
• iron handed

Adjective

ironhanded ‎(comparative more ironhanded, superlative most ironhanded)

1. Strict and dictatorial; exercising ruthless control; iron-fisted.
   • 2010, Tibor Iván Berend, Europe Since 1980, ISBN 0521112400, page 124:

     Nationalist upheaval consumed Yugoslavia after the death of Tito, the ironhanded unifier.

   • 2011, W Paul Vogt, SAGE Quantitative Research Methods, ISBN 1848606990, page 7:

     He was an “ironhanded father-figure” (C. Reid, 1998, p. 216). This ironhanded aspect sometimes went too far, like when he forced Erich Lehmann to resign his editorship of Annals of Mathematical Statistics.

   • 2014, Jane Bluestein, Managing 21st Century Classrooms: How do I avoid ineffective classroom management practices?, ISBN 1416618856, page 3:

     In this traditional context, it's easy to assume that anything short of an ironhanded, authoritarian attitude toward discipline is flat-out permissive, although this common belief is not remotely true.