Asian American immigrants to the United States have long survived and persevered by practicing cooperation and mutual aid. New immigrants have faced hostile environments to their participation in the mainstream economy, either because of exclusionary legislation or because they lack paperwork. The standard trope about immigrants is that through hard work and perseverance new arrivals to the U.S. are able to pull themselves up by their bootstraps. In fact, Asian American immigrants have not only survived but also thrived because of these cooperative institutions.
Anh-Thu Nguyen knows this from first-hand experience. Her parents were Vietnamese boat people, part of the 2-million-person exodus who survived arduous journeys over the ocean from a country left destitute by the war. Both her mother and father were originally from the Mekong Delta region, but met in Florida, where there was an established Vietnamese refugee community.
She credits her family with teaching her the values of self-sufficiency and cooperation that guides her work today at the Democracy at Work Institute, where she directs the creation of cooperative-led value chains in the textile and fashion industries.
[For more on this story by Yvonne Yen Liu, go to http://www.yesmagazine.org/peo...ome-country-20180522]
Comments (0)