The four faces of human suffering in the sociology of Zygmunt Bauman: continuity and change

In this piece, the authors detect and delineate an often neglected core concern within the sociology of Zygmunt Bauman-social suffering. They trace this concern with suffering from the early year writing within a Marxist framework focusing on the working class through middle periods concerned with the Holocaust, Jews, strangers and the Other to the later years and the preoccupation with the victims of consumerism. The authors document how social suffering has remained a significant leitmotif in Zygmunt Bauman's sociology but suggest how his writings on misery and suffering paradoxically point to a world of human possibility and responsibility.