Utopianism in the Work of Zygmunt Bauman - Sociologi - Aalborg ...
Utopianism in the Work of Zygmunt Bauman - Sociologi - Aalborg ...
Utopianism in the Work of Zygmunt Bauman - Sociologi - Aalborg ...
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<strong>in</strong>to iron-cages <strong>of</strong> totalitarianism or authoritarian state apparatuses try<strong>in</strong>g to<br />
force progress on its right way (cf. Olson 1982; Rouvillois 2000). Once real-<br />
ised, as Kolakowski (1983) po<strong>in</strong>ts out, utopias have a bad tendency to turn <strong>in</strong>to<br />
dystopian ambitions <strong>of</strong> perfectibility where humans are made to suffer for a<br />
dream <strong>of</strong> total order, purity and submission. 4 Therefore, just like Kolakowski,<br />
<strong>Bauman</strong> also possesses an anti-utopian current. This anti-utopianism is evident<br />
<strong>in</strong> <strong>the</strong> way he treats <strong>the</strong> modernist hopes <strong>of</strong> creat<strong>in</strong>g a better society based on<br />
rational plann<strong>in</strong>g and <strong>the</strong> sequestration <strong>of</strong> difference: “The new, modern order<br />
took <strong>of</strong>f as a desperate search for structure <strong>in</strong> a would suddenly denuded <strong>of</strong><br />
structure. Utopias that served as beacons for <strong>the</strong> long march to <strong>the</strong> rule <strong>of</strong> rea-<br />
son visualized a world without marg<strong>in</strong>s, leftovers, <strong>the</strong> unaccounted for – with-<br />
out dissidents and rebels” (<strong>Bauman</strong> <strong>in</strong> Beilharz 2001:195). Modern utopias<br />
sought to dissolve disorder <strong>in</strong>to order, annihilate ambivalence and elim<strong>in</strong>ate<br />
adversaries and s<strong>in</strong>ce both capitalism and socialism were children <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> great<br />
project <strong>of</strong> modernity, <strong>the</strong>y were doomed to follow suit <strong>in</strong> this respect. This fi-<br />
nally made <strong>Bauman</strong> doubt whe<strong>the</strong>r socialism could serve as <strong>the</strong> vehicle lead<strong>in</strong>g<br />
towards an alternative social order where human culture was not alienat<strong>in</strong>g and<br />
naturalised and where human suffer<strong>in</strong>g was at best eventually eradicated and<br />
more realistically was at least reduced to a m<strong>in</strong>imum.<br />
Thus, for long, <strong>Bauman</strong> saw <strong>the</strong> Left <strong>in</strong> general and socialism <strong>in</strong> particular<br />
as <strong>the</strong> ‘counter-culture <strong>of</strong> modernity’ (<strong>Bauman</strong> 1986-1987, 1990b, 1991a).<br />
They, modernity and socialism, grew up toge<strong>the</strong>r, were victorious toge<strong>the</strong>r, and<br />
eventually decomposed toge<strong>the</strong>r. Already <strong>in</strong> <strong>the</strong> early 1980’s <strong>Bauman</strong> saw his<br />
hopes attached to <strong>the</strong> work<strong>in</strong>g class movement as <strong>the</strong> bearer <strong>of</strong> an ‘active uto-<br />
pia’ dissolved by <strong>the</strong> assimilation <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong>se potentially revolutionary forces by<br />
corporate capitalism (<strong>Bauman</strong> 1982) as well as by <strong>the</strong> Stal<strong>in</strong>ist regime <strong>of</strong> Wo-<br />
jciech Jaruzelski crush<strong>in</strong>g <strong>the</strong> Solidarnosz upris<strong>in</strong>g <strong>in</strong> Poland. When <strong>Bauman</strong> <strong>in</strong><br />
<strong>the</strong> middle <strong>of</strong> <strong>the</strong> 1970’s expressed <strong>the</strong> hopes <strong>of</strong> socialism as such an ‘active’<br />
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