But our social institutions are ill-equipped for this task and much about them---such as the atomized television and internet culture of mass media---work more against the formation of such a new and unifying identity than in favour of it.  In any case, whatever it is, it must come about "organically" rather than by some "canned" and forced process which resembles a Madison Avenue advertising campaign.  It cannot be imposed, it has to be felt sincerely.   Thus, what's needed has to come about through a truly free and consensual set social processes.

If first causes are the aim-- a "felt sincerely"-- we're gonna have to wait a long time.
I've asked at least ten people here in France to help me understand the process whereby it became self-evident that health care is a human right, and the vast majority have only a sketchy notion. So it's almost inchoate.
Melancthon came closest with his excellent references, but the process whereby such consensus arises is tied deeply to a historical context, an educational process that is capable of producing readers who are also problem solvers, deep roots in a social history that not only allows protest and revolutionary behavior, but rationalizes the dialectic between mutuality-ccoperation, and individual analysis. We don't do that in North America.
My landlady once said the nemesis of France was a plague of meetings. What set her off was the building syndicate- the group of apartment owners who met several times a year to decide how to deal with mutual needs vis. thebuilding. Yet, the building was centuries old, and in prime shape.
We compete. We don't plan to stop. End of story.  

Capitalism searches out the darkest corners of human potential, and mainlines them.