"Gang Demographics"

The National Youth Gang Survey (NYGS) finds that gang activity vary by city size.   In other words, the largest cities such as Chicago, Texas, Pennsylvania and New York have the greatest number of gang members. The key aspects that contribute to the variation in gang activities are;

 Economic and cultural context- cities with high diverse population experience a higher level of poverty. Poverty and racial heterogeneity   contribute to gang violence since majority lack jobs and engage in criminal activities such as selling drugs to make money (Howell, 2011).  White youth also develop   different assumptions on minority and create violence against them.

 Drug-related factors- large cities which are socioeconomically disadvantaged experience more gang violence.  The large cities are highly populated and have high level of poverty (Howell, 2011).  Youths who lack educational attainment, employment and housing end up engaging in criminal activities such as drug-trafficking. For the youth to engage in drug dealing like drug sales and distribution, they own guns.

 Access to crime facilitators- cities with higher availability of firearms have more violence   than cities where access to firms is difficult.  When young people access gangs, they recruit other adolescents and all carry guns to protect themselves. In some cities, young criminals’ access gangs from licensed gun dealers who sells guns illegally or what is known as ‘private sales’ (Howell, 2011). Some cities have poor interventions methods of reducing guns supply and this increase gang access and use.

 

The following are ways in which we can reduce gang activity;

 Community assessments- the community should be in the frontline to conduct assessment and identity the factors that drives adolescents toward joining gangs and committing crime.  Assessment involves defining gangs, understanding the levels of gang activity, crime pattern, classifying them and identity the target group (Howell, 2011). This will help   create a strategic planning   and come up with effective community services.  After conducting assessment, the community should develop prevention and intervention programs at individual level, family level and school and community level.

  In addition to conducting a community assessment, gang activity can be reduced through primary prevention program. This include providing education and training to young people. They should learn the risk of gang involvement, social skills and conflict resolution (Howell, 2011).

 Third, gang activity can be reduce through secondary prevention programs-these include helping the young people who live in low socioeconomic cities. This method will reduce antisocial behaviors, improve school performance and reduce drug use.  In addition to improving their living condition, there should be cognitive behavioral program that aims at helping the adolescents control their anger and understand community norms (Howell, 2011).

 Of these proposed methods, the most effective method that I believe will reduce gang activity is conducting community assessment.  It is not possible to provide primary and secondary intervention programs without conducting a comprehensive assessment to understand the community risk factors that influence young people in joining gangs (Howell, 2011).  This method will help come up with a balanced and an integrated strategy that will address all the selected factors. 

 The number of gangs is rising dramatically especially in large cities. Gang members are posing a serious threat to the public through their gang activities such as shooting, extortion, theft and more (Howell, 2011). However, there are demographic characteristics   of cities that explains the dramatic rise of gang trend. The first feature is population size.  Large cities are experiencing demographic changes due to modern rapid population movement. The higher population is causing social disorganization, lack of social control and rise in poverty.  These conditions influences the second-generation immigrants in joining gang and committing crime such as street robberies to sustain their lives.  The second feature is race and ethnicity- cities with higher number of multiracial groups have higher gang membership.  As the immigrant youth enters in new cities, they face economic and cultural barriers and inadequate family care. They join gangs and live in streets to sustain their life.  The third feature is popular culture (Howell, 2011).  Youth who live in large cities   enjoy the popular music, entertainment and other leisure activities.  The popular culture also portrays the gang lifestyle and this strengths the desire of adolescents to join gang.

   The population size, race and ethnicity and, popular culture matter   because in implementing prevention and intervention programs, it is important to consider the population size because the higher the population the higher the number of gang members and associated crime. In addition, race and ethnicity matter since the higher the rate of multiracial group, the higher the poverty and criminal activity (Howell, 2011).  The factors;   the population size and racial and ethnicity groups are significant as they assist in developing strategies to combat gang activity and involvement. For example, there should a policy on immigration control to prevent the formation of gang and crime. Second, there should be programs designed to improve the lives of the multiracial groups   so that they may engage in constructive things and avoid crime (Howell, 2011).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Reference

 

Howell C. James. (2011). Gangs in America’s Communities. SAGE Publications

 

Howell C. James. (2011). Gang Prevention: An Overview of Research and

Programs.DIANE Publishing