ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to discuss the principal features of marginality and to describe the relative vulnerabilities of communities and places to marginality as a function of both market and extra-market forces. It outlines the sources of unequal development and examines the complex ways in which inequalities and inequities reveal themselves in communities and places. It explores the nature of marginality, the physical and social factors of vulnerability to marginality, and spatial manifestations of marginality. Generic marginality is a condition of a community and territory that has been adversely affected by uneven development. The nature of marginality that pertains to a specific community or territory will depend on the political and economic structure in which it is found. Marginality victimizes locations and communities that are characterized by one or more factors of vulnerability. The territorial or regional scale that marginality takes depends on factors of vulnerability to marginality.
