Zygmunt Bauman’s contribution to the discourse on a risk society

Abstract

The paper will seek to present the risks of the consumer society, with
emphasis on Zygmunt Bauman’s perspective on the affected areas of
social life in the age of liquid modernity.The aim of this paper is theoretical
analysis of the risks of the consumer society, in other words the
synthesis of discourse standpoints concerning the risk society (Beck,
Giddens, Touraine, Bauman) with the focus on specificities of Bauman’s
contribution to the discourse. Besides that, the aim is directed
to the causal explanation of the risk state through the prism of theglobalization
process impact and the dominant ideology of neoliberalism.
Theoretical analysis has resulted in perceiving Bauman’s contribution
to the discourse on risk society in terms of understanding the transformation
of human relations, caused by socio - economic changes in
the sphere of social security and freedom - the essential prerequisites
of a dignified existence of individuals in society.
Concluding observations indicatethe type of risk of the contemporary
society, which is most easily recognized by its dominant attribute –
disintegration of social tissue that is a trademark of liquid modernity
and life under the pressures of precarious existence marked by fear.