Directions: Read the following information carefully and answer the given questions.

There are two main approaches to the understanding of the new ethnic phenomenon. The premordialist approach to ethnicity and ethnic identities considers common descent activated more easily than rational principles and organization founded upon them. The other approach is variously known as situational, subjectivist, or instrumental. Its main emphasis is on group members' perceptions of being different from others and on the implications of this for that group's present status or predicament and for its prospects for the future. These contending approaches are an aid to an explication of issues and to the undertaking of contemporary reality but they do not offer any final answers. They are often no more than exercises in the reconstruction of the past; the definition and redefinition of the situations to explain the present and stratagems and strategies for achieving the desired future. Ethnicity transcends the known boundaries of the state, religion, sect, and class. It seeks to fragment established nationalities and communities and create a new one using ethnic indicators. It involves symbols -old as well as newly created- and their manipulation by competing elites. The symbolic and cultural aspects of ethnicity are important in themselves; and they often get politicized because, in the final analysis, most ethnic conflicts are demands for a larger share of economic resources and products, and for a greater part in decision-making processes. Given identities can be questioned by individuals and groups, and their actions can result in the formation of new identities and symbol systems associated with the articulation of new interests. Ethnicity may thus lead to the redefinition of social and cultural boundaries. Ethnic aspirations and urges have a quicksilver quality, they need to be consistent and firm. This is explained by the quality of leadership of several ethnic movements. A section of the established elite may be behind them, but the elite can be pushed aside and the leadership taken over by arms wielding elements of diverse origins.