Multiple marginality comprises a conceptual framework within which events, times, places, thoughts and people can be sequentially linked into an integrated understanding of the ecological, socioeconomic, cultural and psychosocial factors that push or pull a youth into a gang. Linking these elements of marginality under one framework permits a broader assessment of the problem, avoiding the limitations of single-cause explanations of the gang problem and permitting analysis over time of the impact of macro (group history), meso (family history) and micro (individual life history) level factors. The multiple marginality framework must also include an intense focus on social control or, more precisely, the breakdown of social control in the community. The breakdown of families, schools and policing controls has allowed gang youths to adopt a lifestyle that fulfills important needs for them but is detrimental to the community. To see how multiple marginality applies to the Los Angeles street gang experience, the article reviews the Chicano, African American and Vietnamese communities and the street gangs that have developed within them. References