Zygmunt Bauman's work has reinvigorated sociological interest in ethical questions. Ethics has been at the core of his work for at least the past two decades and he has convincingly positioned ethics and morality as central issues for sociology in our globalized world and liquid modern times. We consider Bauman's decision to prioritize ethics over ontology, to be critical to the understanding of his works' strengths and failings. Through a reading of Emmanuel Lévinas, Bauman wishes to unsettle the traditional prioritizing of the question of how the world is with the question of how the world ought to be.