08 February 2011

Chinese-American Mayors Find Community Diversity an Asset

Mayors Edwin Lee (left) and Jean Quan (right) joined other prominent Chinese-American guests at a White House state dinner for Chinese President Hu Jintao on January 18.

By Joshua Y. Shen
Staff Writer

Washington — The recent White House state dinner for Chinese President Hu Jintao included two special guests with similar histories and matching titles.

More than 30 years ago, she was a university student seeking classes that told the history of her own community. He was a young law clerk helping poor immigrants understand their civil rights.

On January 3, that student, Jean Quan, was inaugurated as the first female mayor of Oakland, California. On January 11, the law clerk — her good friend Edwin Lee — was sworn in as mayor of San Francisco. Each is the first Chinese American to hold that post.

Their achievements were celebrated as signs of Asian Americans’ progress in U.S. political leadership.

According to the Asian Pacific American Institute for Congressional Studies (APAICS), there are approximately 40 Asian-American mayors currently heading U.S. cities, with San Francisco and Oakland the two largest. Within this group, Democratic mayors outnumber Republicans four to one.

“There’s been a political awakening among Asian Americans,” said Gene Kim, communications director with APAICS.

BUILDING COALITIONS

Although Quan and Lee are the first Chinese Americans to lead major U.S. cities, their political paths are shared by many other prominent U.S. leaders.

Quan was a student at the University of California’s Berkeley campus in the late 1960s when she helped organize a movement called the Third World Strike. The movement united ethnic minority students to demand classes that told the stories of their own communities in the United States — stories mostly untold in the existing curriculum.

Quan recognized the importance of expanding her coalitions to include other groups that shared similar histories and struggles for equal rights.

After graduation, Quan continued her political activism by organizing workers in the service industry into unions and reforming education in her community. She went on to spend 20 years as an elected official in Oakland, first as a member of the school board beginning in 1990, and then of the city council in 2002.

During her service, Quan recognized that despite the diversity of ethnicities, income levels and opinions in Oakland, most people worried about the same things: good working conditions, safe neighborhoods, quality education and a healthy environment.

“Whether you supported me for mayor or didn't support me for mayor,” Quan said during her inauguration speech, “we are family because we love this city.”

At a gathering of California’s most prominent mayors, San Francisco's Edwin Lee (second from right) expresses concern about the new California budget.

ORGANIZING COMMUNITIES

Although Quan’s election made news across the United States, her inauguration was a relatively low-key affair compared to the celebration for Lee’s inauguration in San Francisco.

Surrounded by a large group of Asian-American leaders that included Quan, four members of San Francisco’s 11-member board of supervisors and the city’s state senator, Lee’s election as mayor was celebrated as a milestone in the long struggle for Chinese-American rights in the United States.

More than 150 years ago, the first large wave of Chinese immigrated to the United States, many arriving and settling in San Francisco. Some were gold prospectors while others were instrumental in building the United States’ first intercontinental railroad.

The city initiated many anti-Chinese ordinances whose tenets eventually became federal law, culminating in the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act that halted Chinese immigration and denied U.S. citizenship to those immigrants already arrived. In succeeding decades, similar laws severely restricted immigration from other Asian countries.

As a result, many Chinese Americans were separated from their families in China, including spouses and children, for decades. Moreover, the laws discouraged Asian Americans from political engagement for fear of further backlash.

Important Asian-American rights groups arose after the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965, which opened U.S. immigration equally to people of all nationalities and ethnic origins. Organizations like the Chinatown Community Development Center and Asian Law Caucus became vital tools for securing political rights not just for Chinese and other Asians, but also for other immigrant groups, low-wage laborers and poor tenants.

Lee’s early work with the Asian Law Caucus reflected his own roots as a community organizer, helping ensure the rights and wages of vulnerable immigrants and workers. He continued his civil rights work as lead attorney successfully representing Asian Americans and women seeking an equal opportunity to enter San Francisco’s fire department in the 1980s.

His reputation on behalf of the disadvantaged led to his appointment as a credible “watchdog” director of the city’s Human Rights Commission in 1989. He has been in public service ever since.

FUTURE LEADERS

On January 18, Quan and Lee joined President Obama at the state dinner held at the White House for President Hu Jintao of China.

The event hosted a large number of Chinese-American leaders and celebrities, including Representative Judy Chu of California and Department of Commerce Secretary Gary Locke, the former governor of Washington state.

Kim said these leaders represent strong role models for future generations of Asian Americans, proof that the political process in the United States can be accessible.

Like President Obama, many leaders begin as community organizers fighting for rights important to their community, then widened their political support by building effective, diverse coalitions.

“Leaders don’t have to look like you,” Kim said, “but they must show interest in the issues that matter to you.”

(This is a product of the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://www.america.gov)