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Washington Journal

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Celebrating API Women Leaders

By Phil Tajitsu Nash

I remember back in 1980 when the board of the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund (AALDEF) in New York voted to name Margaret Fung as executive director. It was a perfectly logical choice, as Fung was an honors graduate of Barnard College and New York University Law School, with experience at the American Civil Liberties Union and a reputation for leadership and hard work as one of AALDEF’s founders. At the time, there were plenty of Asian American women with leadership potential, but not enough were actually in the point position for their advocacy organizations. A few, like energetic and visionary Lillian Kimura, had served as president of the Japanese American Citizens League and executive director of the National YWCA, but most were serving in secondary roles or heading all-female or social service organizations.

Twenty years later, Margaret is still head of AALDEF, and a new generation of activist Asian American women leaders has come on the scene.

While there are plenty of Irene Hirano’s (Los Angeles), Ruth Woo’s (Seattle), Nasim Memon’s (Virginia), Paula Bagasao’s (Los Angeles), Kazu Iijima’s (New York), Mary Chung’s (Oakland), Grace Uyehara’s (Philadelphia), Moira Shek’s (San Francisco), Chung Wha Hong’s (Queens), and Alaka Paul’s (Maryland) outside the beltway, the nation’s capital has been especially transformed by female leadership over the past two decades.

Looking at our community’s advocacy network in Washington, D.C., many of the key leadership roles are filled by women. The National Asian Pacific American Bar Association is headed by Nancy Choy (who is retiring shortly, after an extraordinary tenure as the group’s founding executive director). Francey Lim Youngberg served in the same role for another key organization, the Asian Pacific American Institute for Congressional Studies (APAICS) before turning to criminal justice and other advocacy issues. The largest labor group, the Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance, is headed by longtime Korean American activist Jin Sook Lee.

Daphne Kwok, who has served the community in a number of capacities, has presided over a period of growth that has made the Organization of Chinese Americans (OCA) a key player, both in Washington and in campus and community groups, for over a decade. Sandy Hoa Dang founded and has energized the Asian American LEAD (Leadership, Education and Development for Youth and Families) organization, so that it not only helps the Southeast Asian refugee community, but is also a place where government officials can learn how better to serve a community still in transition. Filipina American Irene Natividad headed a number of groups, including the influential National Women’s Political Caucus. Kristine Minami is the newest D.C. Representative for the JACL. And lawyer Karen Narasaki heads the National Asian Pacific American Legal Consortium, which addresses legal issues and interfaces with the larger civil rights community here in Washington, D.C.

The impact of these and many other women over the last two decades has transformed the American and Asian American landscapes. As advocates, they and their colleagues have changed a black-white dialogue into a multi-ethnic and multi-racial one. Working with elected API women such as Rep. Patsy Mink (D-Hawaii), they have brought formerly “women’s” issues such as daycare, eldercare and healthcare into the mainstream of legislative debates. They have taken the lead on community issues such as immigration, anti-Asian violence, and redress for interned Japanese Americans. And simply by being women, and demanding that half of all rights, responsibilities and positions go to women, they have opened doors to institutions such as the Supreme Court and United States Senate, which still suffer from lack of gender parity but are nevertheless, more representative than they were even two decades ago.

As we enter the new millennium, it is exciting to see that there are hundreds of API women getting degrees, getting experience, and preparing for even higher leadership roles—both in mainstream and API community organizations. Bright, energetic second-tier women like Stacy Suyat at the Smithsonian’s API Institute and Christine Chen at OCA are gaining skills and contacts, and preparing for the day when they will be the organizational leaders or elective officials the community turns to for assistance. Meanwhile, hundreds of female staff members and college-age API interns are working in Congressional, agency and non-profit organizational offices each year.

While we don’t have any API women at the Republican and Democratic national conventions being considered as candidates for the next president or vice president, my guess is that if enough of them get started soon on local elective and appointive leadership positions, they will be ready for Congressional, statewide, and even national positions before another two decades have passed.