" And now," said the Duke, there's something very unpleasant on the loose. We may pretend that it isn't; we may deny it, but we know that there are more and more people who hate those whom they used not to hate. And there are even some who encourage the hate, who harbour that hate within themselves and are happy to see it flourish in the breasts of others."
...
"I sometimes wonder," said the Duke, "whether this isn't because we started to dismantle nations. Nations gave people a sense of common identity and encouraged concern for others - because of the community implicit in the idea of the nation. We started to chip away at that in the name of a wider, transcendent identity but... but perhaps that hasn't worked and as a result, we've been cast adrift, our previous links and binds dissolved or discredited, suspicious of one another, ready to distrust our neighbours. "

― Alexander McCall Smith