Korean Immigrant Workers Advocates

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The Koreatown Immigrant Workers Alliance (KIWA, pronounced kee-wah), better known under its past name Korean Immigrant Workers Advocates, is a multi-ethnic immigrant worker civil rights membership organization based in the Los Angeles Koreatown area.

KIWA was founded in 1992 by progressive minded Korean activists who saw class as the basic contradiction of the immigrant society in Koreatown. It has since been involved in the aftermath of the 1992 Los Angeles Civil Unrest, campaigns to improve working conditions and immigrant worker empowerment in various korean ethnic industries, and the living wages campaign.

KIWA is perhaps best known recently for its long campaign against Assi Market, the largest ethnic Korean-owned supermarket of the United States, located in Koreatown. Started in the late 90's, KIWA demands that Assi management return the dozens of fired Latino and Korean workers to their workplace, from where they were fired for trying to organize themselves.

Although staffed mostly by ethnic Koreans in its inception, KIWA grew to encompass APIA and Latino organizers and members. The spanish language "Alianza de trabajadores inmigrantes del Barrio Coreano" had been in common use since the 2000's; however the English language name was officially changed in March of 2006 from Korean Immigrant Workers Advocates to Koreatown Immigrant Workers Alliance. The Korean language "한인노동상담소" (Korean Worker's Center) still remains in use.

KIWA is a member organization of MIWON (Multi-Ethnic Immigrant Workers Alliance [1]), an alliance of five immigrant worker's centers in the Los Angeles area, and ENLACE, a U.S.-Mexico network of worker's centers.