Since the premiere production of Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992 nearly 30 years ago, the social and political relationship between the AAPI and African American communities has changed in many ways. The Harvard affirmative action case being heard by the Supreme Court in two weeks embodies a growing solidarity movement between these two groups, accelerated by the events of the summer of 2020. Join us to discuss the evolving solidarity movement—and its challenges—with Taeku Lee (Harvard University), Jonathan Loc (Harvard Kennedy School student), Kenneth W. Mack (Harvard Law School), and Janelle Wong (University of Maryland).
Co-presented by The Roy and Lila Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation at the Harvard Kennedy School
Taeku Lee
Taeku Lee is the inaugural Bae Family Professor of Government at Harvard University. He serves on the National Advisory Committee for the U.S. Census Bureau and as a senior fellow of the AAPI Civic Engagement Fund. Current projects include the upcoming publication of a co-authored undergraduate textbook on race and American democracy with Cambridge University Press; ongoing work on Banklash, which examines public opinion on financial regulation in six countries; and research on Asian American identity and discrimination.
Jonathan Loc
Jonathan Loc is a Master of Public Policy candidate at the Harvard Kennedy School (HKS). He is an active member of the Coalition for a Diverse Harvard and the AAPI Caucus at HKS. He has organized multiple teach-ins in support of affirmative action. Before coming to Harvard, he graduated from UCLA with a degree in political science and a minor in Asian American studies. He also served as a staff member on the Proposition 16 campaign in California that aimed to reinstate affirmative action there.
Kenneth W. Mack
Kenneth W. Mack is the inaugural Lawrence D. Biele Professor of Law and Affiliate Professor of History at Harvard University. He is also the co-faculty leader of the Harvard Law School Program on Law and History. His 2012 book, Representing the Race: The Creation of the Civil Rights Lawyer (Harvard University Press), was a Washington Post Best Book of the Year, a National Book Festival Selection, was awarded honorable mention for the J. Willard Hurst Award by the Law and Society Association, and was a finalist for the Julia Ward Howe Book Award.
Janelle Wong
Janelle Wong is Professor in the Departments of Government and Politics and American Studies and a core faculty member in the Asian American Studies Program. From 2001 to 2012, Wong was in the Departments of Political Science and American Studies and Ethnicity at the University of Southern California. She received her PhD from the Department of Political Science at Yale University. Wong is the author of Immigrants, Evangelicals and Politics in an Era of Demographic Change (2018, Russell Sage Foundation) and Democracy’s Promise: Immigrants and American Civic Institutions (2006, University of Michigan Press).
