Social problems of individualization in the works by Ulrich Beck and Sigmund Bauman

The article deals with the social problems of individualization and individualized society revealed in the theories of English sociologist and philosopher Zygmunt Bauman and German sociologist Ulrich Beck. Individualization has come to be regarded as an important construct characterizing the society of the “second modernity”, one of the specifying markers of the ongoing changes. The key point of social transformation is the increasing distance of people, individuals from social institutions, “private from common”. This is manifested in the diminishing importance of class, religious, family and gender roles. There is an “erosion” of traditional collective categories. An important feature of the processes of individualization is the requirement of an individual's active participation in his or her own destiny. Under the influence of external forces person should constantly make a choice and bear solely individual responsibility for his fate, unlike in the previous era. Using the topic of employment as an example, we have analyzed the problem of precarization and precariat, in particular in Russia. The article also touches upon such social consequences of the individualization process as the transformation of family and interpersonal relations.