The Epidemic of a Generation: The Growth of Youth Gangs in America
By Chantel Bivins, Managing Editor

What is a youth gang?

The terms “youth gang” and “street gang” are commonly used interchangeably, and refer to neighborhood or street-based youth groups that are substantially made up of individuals under the age of 24. Although gangs are known for being based in the inner-city, small towns and rural communities have emerging youth gang problems. According to the National Youth Gang Center’s June 2005 report “Gangs in Small Towns and Rural Counties,” between 1996 to 2001, gang-problem patterns were recorded for 1,066 agencies representing rural counties and smaller cities (populations between 2,500 and 25,000), and they found that very few agencies in these areas reported persistent, ongoing gang problems (i.e. 4 percent of the rural counties, and 10 percent of the smaller cities).

Early and Contemporary Gangs

Early in American history, gangs seem to have been most visible and most violent during periods of rapid population shifts. Changing demographics in some small towns and rural areas may contribute to the escalation of gang problems. This may be related to the immigration of newly arrived racial or ethnic groups into an area. Hispanics have grown to be the second-largest ethnic group in the country, totaling nearly 40 million people in 2003 (The Tomas Rivera Policy Institute, 2004). They represent the largest ethnic minority in nearly half of the states, and their numbers are growing fastest in the South, although the largest Latino concentrations are in the West, South Florida, and a few large cities.

In the early 19th century, youth gangs in the United States were primarily Irish, Jewish, and Italian. According to a recent national law enforcement survey, the ethnicity of gang members is 48 percent African-American, 43 percent Hispanic, 5 percent white, and 4 percent Asian. However, student surveys show a much larger representation of white adolescents among gang members. Despite the disproportionate representation of minority group members in studies as compared with white youth, “blacks and Hispanics have no special predisposition to gang membership. Rather, they simply are overrepresented in those areas most likely to lead to gang activity” (Bursik and Grasmick, 1993).

Contemporary youth gangs are located primarily in lower-class, slum, ghetto, barrio, and working-class communities. However, it is not clear that either class, culture, race or ethnicity, or social change primarily account for gang problems. Gang experts say at least 21,500 gangs, with more than 731,000 members, are active worldwide. Ten percent of gang members are females. An initial survey of cities with gang problems indicates that by far the most common female gangs are auxiliary gangs affiliated with male gangs. Female gang violence was more likely to involve simple battery or assault rather than homicide, and female nonviolent crimes consisted mainly of liquor law violations. In terms of types of offenses, African-American gangs are relatively more involved in drug offenses, Hispanic gangs are more involved in “turf related” violence, and Asian and white gangs deal more in property crimes.

Where are gangs located?

Gangs are just not located in cities and towns, but they are also in prisons, schools, and juvenile detention centers. Gangs clearly present significant problems in juvenile detention and correctional facilities where they form, recruit members, and evidence suggest that they contribute to institutional violence. The formation of gangs probably is related to inmates’ need for protection from other inmates. Confinement in a juvenile correctional facility is one of the strongest predictors of adult prison gang membership (Ralph, et al, 1996).

Risk factors for gang membership have been studied using many types of research methods, including cross-sectional, longitudinal, and ethnographic (observational) studies. The domains studied were community, family, school, peer group, and individual. Some reasons for gang membership in schools are:

• Academic failure;
• Low educational aspirations, especially among females;
• Negative labeling by teachers;
• Trouble at school;
• Few teacher role models;
• Educational frustration;
• Low commitment to school, low school attachment, high levels of antisocial behavior in school;
• Low achievement test scores; and
• Identification as being learning disabled.

Gangs are very prevalent in schools. More than one-third (37 percent) of the students surveyed in the 1995 School Crime Survey reported gangs in their schools. This number included nearly two-thirds of Hispanic students, almost one-half of black students, and one-third of white students. Youth gangs are also linked with serious crime problems in elementary and secondary schools in the United States.

Gang Legislation

Fifty states and the District of Columbia currently have gang related legislation. Critics say that legislation that increases penalties for gang membership and gang crimes won’t solve the problem, but developing an Anti-Gang Action Plan may be the answer. According to the National Youth Gang Center, The Comprehensive Gang Model incorporates a problem-solving approach to gang-related crime by engaging law enforcement, prosecution, juvenile and criminal court officials, correctional officials, social and youth services representatives, and other community stakeholders in a comprehensive assessment of the gang problem and crime trends involving gang members. The six steps of the plan involve:

1) Acknowledge the gang problem;
2) Form an agreement among stakeholders to work together in addressing the potential gang problem;
3) Conduct an objective assessment of the potential gang problem using the NYGC gang problem assessment protocol;
4) Set goals and objectives;
5) Develop and integrate relevant services and strategies, using the NYGC planning and implementation guide; and
6) Develop and evaluate a comprehensive gang strategy.

Other solutions, or examples of best practices include:

• Preventing children and adolescents from joining gangs. For example, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms has implemented a school-based gang prevention curriculum;
• The Comprehensive Community-Wide Approach to Gang Prevention, Intervention, and
• Suppression Program developed by Spergel and his colleagues; and
• The Tri-Agency Resource Gang Enforcement Team (TARGET) is a comprehensive strategy that supports gang interdiction, apprehension, and prosecution.

For more information on youth gangs visit:

• Criminal Justice Resources: http://www.lib.msu.edu/harris23/crimjust/gangs.htm
• Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, US Department of Justice: http://ojjdp.ncjrs.org
• Institute for Intergovernmental Research: http://www.iir.com/nygc/acgp/model.htm