Since the sixteenth century and the advent of the nation-state, people in the West have come to understand that 'society' to mean an association of individuals. Until recently that understanding was accompanied by a sense of difference, a sense that other cultures had a different basis of organization, whether that was castle, clan or tribe. But in recent decades the Western impact on the rest of the world through capitalism, the spread of democracy and the language of human rights has weakened such a sense of difference.