Professional paper
Lessons of the Holocaust. Zygmunt Bauman’s Sociology of the Holocaust
Andriana Benčić
orcid.org/0000-0002-4025-1176
; Doctoral Student, Sociology, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia
Abstract
This paper discusses the cultural and sociological background of the Holocaust, based on Zygmunt Bauman’s modernity theory. By observing the paradoxes of western societies’ modern development it is argued that the Holocaust could have happened not despite but thanks to modernity. A high level of bureaucratization and scientific and technological progress, together with the diffusion of moral responsibility, create potential for social conflicts of greater intensity. In this paper, lessons of the Holocaust are therefore discussed not so much with regards to ethnic Jews but as a reference point for a critical examination of modern societies. By drawing similarities between solid and liquid modernity (postmodernity), the paper points to dangers of new categorical murders, which can develop in the context of globalized societies that rely on the same principles of instrumental rationality and action devoid of moral judgment. The most important lesson that should be learned from the legacy of the Holocaust is the need to redirect our attention to the sources of genocidal/categorical murders and take common actions in order to prevent them.
Keywords
genocide; Holocaust; instrumental-rational action; categorical murders; modernity; morality; Zygmunt Bauman
Hrčak ID:
114871
URI
Publication date:
15.1.2014.
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