Asian American Political Alliance

The Asian American Political Alliance (AAPA) was a political organization started at University of California, Berkeley in 1968 that aimed to unite all Asian Americans under one identity to push for political and social action. The two main chapters were at UC Berkeley, and San Francisco State College, both of which became heavily involved in the larger Asian American movement throughout the 1960s, including at the Third World Liberation Front strikes at SF State and at UC Berkeley. The AAPA identified as an anti-imperialistic, Third World political organization that fought for self-determination and liberation for Asian Americans. They expressed solidarity and support for other people of color throughout the US and throughout the world, particularly in colonized or recently decolonized countries. The AAPA's participation in the Third World Liberation Front strikes at SF State and UC Berkeley resulted in the creation of a School of Ethnic Studies at SF State and an Ethnic Studies department at UC Berkeley. The AAPA was also involved in movements such as the Black Power Movement and the anti-Vietnam War movement. Although both main chapters were short-lived and disbanded in 1969, the AAPA played a large role in the Asian American movement and was influential in encouraging other Asian Americans to get involved in political action.

The AAPA was created in May 1968 at UC Berkeley by Yuji Ichioka and Emma Gee. Ichioka and Gee had noticed that most of the Asian Americans who were taking part in student protests were only participating as individuals rather than as a coalition. Because of this, they wanted to create an organization to unite all Asian Americans under one group to fight for social and political change. To do this, they looked through the roster of the Peace and Freedom Party and invited everyone with Asian surnames to discuss the idea for a potential group at a meeting. The first meeting was held in Ichioka and Gee's apartment, where they decided to form the Asian American Political Alliance. Many of the original founding members from this first meeting had prior political experience through anti-war movements, United Farm Workers, the Black Panther Party, or civil rights movements. Although most of them were students at UC Berkeley, they did not want AAPA to be a student organization; rather, they aimed to create a wide-reaching, community grassroots organization. They purposefully chose the words "Political" and "Alliance" as part of their name in order to show that they were a political organization aimed towards Third World liberation, not a social or cultural club. The words "Asian American" were used to signify that this group was created as a multi-ethnic group to unite all Asians. In fact, this was the first use of the term "Asian American" instead of terms like "Oriental" that were used before.

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