Dear Friends,

I would humbly like to post the following information on my book: Legacies of Struggle: Conflict and Cooperation in Korean American politics (Stanford University Press, 2007) for anyone interested in community-based organizations in Koreatown. The manuscript was the product of my Ph.D. dissertation at UCLA and my first insight into Koreatown community politics which turned out to be a humbling experience after watching the passion and hard work of community organizers in Koreatown. Below I’ve included a book summary. The book touches on a wide range of topics such as building “ethnic solidarity” in suburbanizing communities; the politics of negotiating the multiracial context of ethnic enclaves; the political strategies organizations have used to tackle inequality (e.g. labor and gender) within the community; the dyamics of intergenerational conflict and cooperation among leaders; the historical evolution of Koreatown; and the process of ethnic identity formation among a diversifying second generation.

I would greatly appreciate any feedback or suggestions you may have in terms of content and course adoption, especially since it will help me plan out my new book on children of immigrant families. If you would like a free copy to consider for course adoption, you can stop by the Stanford booth at the conference or click on the following link: http://www.sup.org/instructors/instructors.cgi?x=exam.

http://www.sup.org/book.cgi?isbn=0804756570
http://www.amazon.com/Legacies-Struggle-Conflict-Cooperation-American/dp/

0804756589/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1216675262&sr=8-1

LEGACIES OF STRUGGLE explores the intergenerational dynamics of first-generation (foreign-born) and 1.5/ 2nd generation (American-born) organizations in post-Riot Koreatown, LA in order to understand how community-based organizations, can navigate traditional ethnic power structures and the evolving, multiracial context of ethnic enclaves like Koreatown to achieve their political goals. In particular, the book examines the different strategies that these 1.5/ 2nd generation-run ethnic organizations use to create a sense of ethnic solidarity among their constituents against the forces of mobility and assimilation that have fractured the broader ethnic community. Although Koreatown is becoming divided by intergenerational conflict, class polarization, and suburban flight, the book shows how Korean American organizations are able to cultivate ethnic political solidarity through the centralized resources and institutional infrastructures of the old enclave economy, which continues to expand economically despite the suburbanization of Korean American residents. Because the immigrant elite control the enclave’s resources, Chung argues that the American-born leadership must strategically negotiate its political agenda and mainstream ties within traditional immigrant power structures.
Based on a broad survey of Koreatown politics and an in-depth analysis of two organizations, the book identifies two ways 1.5/ 2nd generation ethnic organizations have cultivated ethnic political solidarity: one based on an middle-class approach to ethnic political solidarity that works in accommodation to the immigrant elite (Korean Youth and Community Center (KYCC)) and the other on a broader social justice framework of ethnicity based on alliances with outside interest groups (Korean Immigrant Workers Advocate (KIWA)). Both cases challenge the traditional assumption that assimilation undermines ethnicity as a meaningful framework for political solidarity among the American-born generation. These diverse strategies ultimately lead to the diversification and specialization of ethnic political structures, not its disintegration. Legacies of Struggle reveals how such community-based organizations have thus created innovative spaces for political participation among Korean Americans.

In the latter case, KIWA’s progressive mission and strong stance against the exploitative labor practices of Korean businessowners in regards to Korean and Latino workers have raised major opposition from Korean immigrant businessowners and other members of the traditional ethnic elite. As opposed to isolating themselves from the ethnic community, Chung shows how KIWA is able to do what mainstream labor unions can not—that is, mobilize a strong but malleable co-ethnic membership by providing a progressive space for diverse Korean American activists excluded from the conservative immigrant-dominated power structure. However, because the organization lacks substantial funding and support from the ethnic elite, KIWA’s success ultimately lies in its ability to cultivate alliances with labor unions, leftist racial organizations, and other progressive groups outside Koreatown in order to employ external pressure against immigrant powerholders with minimal financial costs.

Chung’s research makes several contributions in terms of understanding how children of immigrants and contemporary ethnic politics are challenging traditional scholarship on assimilation and incorporation. First, it shows how 1.5/ 2nd generation organizations in the contemporary era can re-create the ideological and institutional foundations of ethnic solidarity among their membership despite socioeconomic mobility and class-based divisions. The study considers how community-based organizations are adopting new political strategies to accommodate to the shifting demographic patterns of post-1965 immigrant populations, whose assimilation trajectories are too diverse to fit traditional one-dimensional models of political participation.

Acknowledging the significance of inequality within ethnic communities, Chung also reveals how marginalized leftist organizations can use mainstream resources to contest the dominance of traditional powerholders within the enclave based on a new and flexible approach to ethnic solidarity—thereby opening new avenues for political
participation among second-generation Korean Americans who do not fit the traditional mold. Such grassroots strategies are particularly crucial in an era where ethnic enclaves have become the main sites of globalized labor exploitation yet mainstream labor unions are neither interested nor well-equipped to tackle the internal power structures of Asian immigrant communities.

Finally, Chung’s study reveals how the different bases of empowerment—that is, one rooted within the ethnic community and the other in mainstream society—can be harnessed to generate inter-generational and inter-racial cooperation based on “complementary resources” (i.e. mutually providing networks and resources that the other lacks). In this respect, the book underscores the strategic ways in which racial and ethnic populations may find lines of commonality with other minority groups in the post-Civil Rights era, despite the widening ethnic and class interests that divide them.