Inextricably merged

What happens in a disaster is that people can see clearly how important to their individual well-beings is the collective well-being. 

Rather than turning into extremely selfish marauders the sensible and most immediate thing to do is to fortify that community to which one most belongs. The slow grind of daily life that imprisons people in isolated chambers comes during a disaster to a startling hault. Instead, solidarity and empathy enable a sense of connectedness and belonging beyond what ordinary life in today's world offers up. 

"The 'outsider' becomes an 'insider,' the 'marginal man' becomes a 'central man.' People are thus able to perceive, with a clarity never before possible, a set of underlying basic values to which all people subscribe. They realize that collective action is necessary for these values to be maintained and that individual and group goals are inextricably merged. This merging of individual and societal needs provides a feeling of belonging and a sense of unity rarely acheived under normal circumstances." (Charles Fritz as quoted in A Paradise Built In Hell, Rebecca Solnit, 2009; page 108.)