The Asian Pacific Islander’s Civic Action Network (APIs CAN) is a statewide network in Massachusetts, coalescing over 20 AAPI and primarily working class-serving organizations.
Our mission is rooted in a commitment towards racial and wealth equity of the Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC) community while representing the pan-Asian perspective. Over the past eight years, the coalition has had significant wins in advancing progressive policy in Massachusetts and working on the ground with partners to counter rising anti-AAPI hate.
The Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) communities in Massachusetts have historically been underrepresented and marginalized.
In addition to the discriminatory laws and practices put in place at the federal level (for example, the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 that led to a reduction of Chinese immigration across the United States), Asian and Pacific Islander communities in Massachusetts have faced various barriers. When Southeast Asian migrants settled in East Boston, Dorchester, Lowell and Lawrence, and Worcester in the 1970s and 1980s after escaping their war-torn countries, they faced nativism and racial hostility where they became the targets of widespread harassment and abuse. A 1987 report by the Asian American Resource Workshop (AARW) described the racial hostility and harassment as including banging on doors, rock throwing, verbal abuse, and police violence. Vandalism to Asian immigrants’ homes, cars, and other properties were common as well as physical attacks and arson. Following the September 11 attacks in 2001, South Asian, Muslim, and Sikh communities in Massachusetts experienced heightened surveillance, particularly in community and religious gathering spaces with the start of the Trump Administration in 2016 and continuing to the present, Southeast Asian communities in the Commonwealth have seen a significant rise in detentions by ICE and deportations. Such hostility and harassment continue to this day, especially in the post-COVID-19 years where communities across the country saw a sharp increase in harassment and violence against Asian people, especially Asian elders.
Asian Americans are the fastest growing racial group in the Greater Boston area and many other Massachusetts communities. From 2010 to 2020, Asian American residents in Massachusetts grew by 47.8%, and Asian Americans make up more than 30% of the total population in some Massachusetts cities. In the City of Lowell, for example, there are over 30,000 residents of Cambodian ancestry, making it the second-largest Cambodian community in the United States. Similarly, Boston’s Chinatown, one of the oldest and largest Chinatowns in the Northeastern United States, supports the over 34,000 Chinese-identifying residents of Boston.
Equity and Racial Justice
Uniting a Pan-Asian American Identity
Centering voices of most marginalized members of the AAPI community
Values
APIs CAN is led by a steering committee made up of eight leading voices and organizations.
Steering Committee
Our member organizations form the core of APIs CAN's advocacy work and are committed to our shared platform. We are service providers, grassroots organizing centers, community developers, resident associations, affinity groups, and more.
Members
Asian American Resource Workshop
The Asian American Resource Workshop (AARW) is a political home for pan-Asian communities in Greater Boston. We are a member-led organization committed to building grassroots power through political education, creative expression, and issue-based and neighborhood organizing.
Asian Task Force Against Domestic Violence
ATASK was founded in 1992 to address the lack of accessible services to limited English proficient (LEP) speaking Asian victims of domestic violence and abuse in Massachusetts. Through our mission, ATASK empowers Asian survivors of domestic violence and abuse to rebuild their lives. Our work bridges language and cultural gaps for Asian communities and advocates for social change. ATASK’s comprehensive and holistic programs and services include a 24-hour Hotline, in-language Community-based Advocacy and Case Management, Language Access Program, Emergency Shelter, Shelter Children's Program, Legal Advocacy and Representation Program, Outreach & Community Engagement, ESOL, and Economic Empowerment Program. Services are free, confidential, and available in 23 Asian languages to both documented and undocumented individuals.
Asian Community Development Corporation
ACDC works in underserved and immigrant Asian American communities in the Greater Boston region to create and preserve affordable, sustainable, and healthy neighborhoods. We achieve this by building affordable homes and vibrant spaces, empowering families with asset-building tools, and strengthening communities through resident and youth leadership.
Boston Chinatown Neighborhood Center
For more than 50 years, BCNC has been providing new immigrants, especially Asians, with the support and resources they need to thrive in the United States. With deep roots in Boston's Chinatown neighborhood, BCNC now serves people from three locations in Greater Boston and the South Shore. Its holistic, family-centered programs reach 13,000 children, youth, and adults each year, setting them up for success in school, work and life. BCNC also builds vibrant communities through Pao Arts Center, along with its collaborations and research.
Cambodian Mutual Assistance Association
The Cambodian Mutual Assistance Association's (CMAA) mission is to improve the quality of life for Cambodian-Americans, as well as other minorities and economically disadvantaged persons in Lowell, MA through educational, cultural, economic and social programs.
Chinese Progressive Association
The Chinese Progressive Association is a grassroots community organization which works for full equality and empowerment of the Chinese community in the Greater Boston area and beyond. Our activities seek to improve the living and working conditions of Chinese Americans and to involve ordinary community members in making decisions that affect our lives.
Vietnamese American Initiative for Development
VietAID was founded in 1994 by community leaders and residents who believed that a community development corporation would provide comprehensive economic development programs and services to alleviate poverty and advance civic participation in the Fields Corner Vietnamese community of Dorchester. VietAID’s mission is to build a strong Vietnamese community and a vibrant Fields Corner through the following measures: promoting civic engagement and community building; developing affordable housing and commercial space; providing small business technical assistance and micro-enterprise development; and offering high quality child care services.
As part of our work to build a network of progressive, working class AAPI organizations, APIs CAN has focused on building a shared civil rights agenda for the AAPI community in Massachusetts, expanding from only working on issues of voting and civic action to engaging AAPI communities on a wide range of issues and representing the perspective of working class AAPI communities within the mainstream discourse in our state.
This expansion of work began during the COVID-19 pandemic, when our groups came together to address both the rise of anti-Asian violence and the immediate needs of our communities, including food, rental relief, and unemployment. Through this crisis response and expanded work, we built trust across the coalition and identified the need to expand our work. Now, APIs CAN continues to play a key role in leading civic participation, language access, and voting access for AAPI communities, while continuing to work on the root causes of anti-Asian violence and racism through our civil rights agenda. This is coupled with coordinating on responding to individual cases of anti-Asian violence and working together to create broad narrative change. In addition, APIs CAN is supporting work with young people and education equity, particularly after we passed the strongest data equity legislation in the country in 2023 (H.3115).
Leadership
Jaya Savita Aiyer, Executive Director
Jaya is the Director of the Asian Pacific Islanders Civic Action Network (APIs CAN), the statewide network in Massachusetts, coalescing over 20 AAPI and primarily working class-serving organizations. Started in 2016, APIs CAN came together in order to build the political power of working class, immigrant and refugee pan-Asian communities, particularly in areas where there is now a concentration of Asian community but lacking political representation. APIs CAN’s mission is rooted in a commitment towards racial and wealth equity for Black, Indigenous, and People of Color communities while representing the pan-Asian perspective. Over the past eight years, the coalition has had significant wins in advancing progressive policy in Massachusetts and working on the ground with partners to counter rising anti-AAPI hate.
Prior to APIs CAN, Jaya was the Campaign Director at Ultraviolet where she ran campaigns focused on corporate accountability and countering gendered and racialized hate online. As the daughter of immigrants, Jaya is passionate about building solidarity and kinship across communities to achieve a more equitable society.