About Us

AAPIP's Vision

• Expand circles of philanthropy and their extent of giving to AAPI communities by educating the philanthropic sector about issues facing AAPIs;

• Support and facilitate capacity building of key AAPI organizations through strategic grantmaking and new approaches to social justice philanthropy;

• Promote equity, diversity, and leadership in the philanthropic sector;

• Develop a diverse national membership organization with a regional infrastructure representative of geographic areas with major concentrations of AAPI populations.

Founded in 1990,  AAPIP is a national membership and philanthropic advocacy organization dedicated to advancing philanthropy and Asian American/Pacific Islander communities. Our members include foundations, staff and trustees of grantmaking institutions, and nonprofit organizations in ten regional chapters in the United States. AAPIP engages communities and philanthropy to address unmet needs; serves as a resource for and about AAPI communities; supports and facilitates giving by and to our communities; and incubates new ideas and approaches for social justice philanthropy.

Building Democratic Philanthropy is a practice. It’s about listening to and starting with the vision of communities first, and investing in their own assets as the starting place for any blueprint to maximize their potential. It’s a call to leverage individual action for collective good.

There may be no clearer expression of Building Democratic Philanthropy than AAPIP’s commitment to community philanthropy. Communities expand their pool of economic assets, build their social capital and demonstrate enhanced and increased capacity to develop tools that meet their own needs. Giving Circles are neither a substitute nor a stand-in for foundations and institutional philanthropic investment. Instead, Giving Circles represent both an opportunity and an open invitation to foundations—to invest significantly in community philanthropy as a strategic path to increasing philanthropic capital to our communities and in moving individuals to act on their own philanthropic initiative.