Stewart Kwoh

Stewart Kwoh is the founding president and executive director of the Asian Pacific American Legal Center (APALC) based in Los Angeles. Founded in 1983, APALC has become, under Kwoh’s leadership, the largest and most diverse legal assistance and civil rights organization representing the Asian Pacific Islander community in the United States. Kwoh is also vice-chair of the Board of Directors for the Asian American Justice Center (formerly the National Asian Pacific American Legal Consortium) which was founded by APALC in 1991.

In June 1998, Kwoh was named a MacArthur Foundation fellow. He was the first Asian American attorney and human rights activist to receive this highly prestigious recognition.

Kwoh earned his B.A. from UCLA and his law degree from the UCLA School of Law. He also teaches an undergraduate class called “Asian Americans and the Law” at UCLA.

Having grown up in Los Angeles, Kwoh has actively pursued interests in a wide range of community issues. After the civil unrest in 1992, he helped to initiate the Multicultural Collaborative, a committee of 11 minority organizations dedicated to developing a comprehensive plan for human relations improvement in Los Angeles. He has been a steering committee member of the Coalition for Humane Immigration Rights for Los Angeles (CHIRLA) and chair of the Board of Directors (2000-2002) of The California Endowment.

Kwoh is the co-author of Uncommon Common Ground: Race and America’s Future (2010) and Searching for the Uncommon Common Ground: New Dimensions on Race in America (2002). He is also editor and co-author of Untold Civil Rights Stories: Asian Americans Speak Out for Justice (2009), a book focusing on Asian American civil rights heroes.