aeo This is a powerful and challenging new work offering a fresh and provocative account of the issues raised by the modernity/postmodernity debate. aeo Bauman is one of the leading social thinkers today. aeo The hardback was highly acclaimed and sold well.

Introduction. 1. The Scandal of Ambivalence. 2. Social Construction of Ambivalence. 3. Self-Construction of Ambivalence. 4. A Case Study in the Sociology of Assimilation (I):. Trapped in Ambivalence. 5. A Case Study in the Sociology of Assimilation (II):. Revenge of Ambivalence. 6. Privatization of Ambivalence. 7. Postmodernity, or Living with Ambivalence.

Modernity, argues Bauman, promised to bring the kind of clarity and transparency to human life that only reason can offer. This has not happened, and today we no longer believe that it ever will. We are ever more acutely aware of the irredeemable contingency of our existence, choices, identities and life-projects. Bauman goes on to examine why modernity did not deliver its promise. He argues that the answers lie in the promise itself and in the self-defeating nature of all attempts to fulfil it. Our post-modern age, Bauman suggests, is the time for reconciliation with ambivalence, and the time to learn how to live in an incurably ambiguous world.

'Both parts [of the book] contain powerful critiques which contribute significantly to an area of debate which is rapidly coming to define the very promise of the sociological project.' Sociology 'An argument rich in insight, imposing in its range and reference.' New Statesman and Society 'A fascinating and highly original book which tells the story of modern men and women entrapped in ambivalence.' Agnes Heller, New School for Social Research '[A] remarkable and passionate text.' Sociology 'Sensitive and intellectually highly stimulating work, Modernity and Ambivalence fuses the parochial and the universal, the historical and the theoretical, in a masterly fashion.' Muslim World Book Review