Linguistic precision matters, but the term 'hard right' isn’t the real threat to clarity. Federico Taddei argues that the real problem lies in how journalists and scholars misuse or oversimplify the categories political science has worked long and hard to define
In a recent piece on The Loop, Tim Bale issued a call to arms: scholars of the far right should resist the media’s growing use of the label 'hard right', which he sees as euphemistic and dangerously imprecise. Bale's alarm over linguistic slippage is understandable, but I feel it overlooks a more fundamental issue. Even academic terminology, when misused or oversimplified, can blur rather than clarify political phenomena.
The problem is not the neologism 'hard right' per se. It’s the careless use (or worse, total neglect) of the categories that political science has carefully developed over decades. Replacing 'hard right' with the umbrella term 'far right' solves little if we haven't already committed to using the analytical distinctions embedded in our typologies.
Replacing 'hard right' with the umbrella term 'far right' risks merely reproducing the same imprecision as 'hard right'
Bale himself seems to blur these lines. While he cites the rise of Rassemblement National in France or Fratelli d’Italia in Italy, it’s unclear whether he is referring to them as populist radical right (PRR) or extreme right (ER) actors. These are two types of parties with very different relationships to democracy, and very different implications in the literature. Labelling all of them 'far right' risks reproducing the same imprecision as 'hard right', which he critiques.
Categories like PRR and ER exist for a reason. They help us distinguish between parties that, while ideologically similar, diverge significantly in their commitment to liberal-democratic norms, and in their approach to democracy as a whole. If these distinctions are too complex for newspaper headlines, fine. But they should not be discarded in academic or policy debates. Either we use them consistently, or we concede that we are speaking politically, not analytically.
Bale argues that journalists and broadcasters use euphemisms like 'hard right' out of fear of losing access to sources, or of legal threats, as in the BBC-Reform UK case. But it’s also worth asking whether the widespread use of 'far right' serves another purpose in some contexts: to delegitimise everything that sits outside the centre-right. In that sense, 'far right' becomes less a scientific term and more a polemical weapon.
If 'hard right' helps readers recognise a political space to the right of mainstream conservatives, but not necessarily in the same space of anti-democratic or neo-fascist actors, it serves a useful role
This is why I’m less alarmed than Bale by the emergence of 'hard right'. If it helps readers recognise a specific political space to the right of mainstream conservatives, but not necessarily in the same space of anti-democratic or neo-fascist actors, then it serves an informative role. That is exactly what journalism is supposed to do.
In Italy, we face the opposite problem. The term ultradestra (ultra-right) has long existed in public discourse to describe anything even slightly to the right of the mainstream conservative bloc. The result? The same kind of confusion we see elsewhere: no clear distinction between PRR and ER, or between governing right-wing parties and truly extremist ones.
In the end, we face a choice. Either we accept that journalistic language will always simplify and judge it by its usefulness to readers, not by academic standards. Or we collectively insist on the categories political science has given us: radical is radical, extreme is extreme. Parties like Rassemblement National, Fratelli d’Italia, or Alternative für Deutschland are one thing; Golden Dawn, People's Party Our Slovakia, or Mi Hazánk Mozgalom (Our Homeland Movement, MHM) are another.
Should we accept that journalistic language will inevitably simplify? Or should we insist on the categories political science has given us, and apply them with consistency?
Both approaches are valid. But only the latter is consistent with the analytical rigour Bale seeks to defend.
As the old Latins would have said: Errare humanum est, sed perseverare diabolicum. To err is human, but to persevere in error is diabolical.
