The Chinese Progressive Association (CPA) is a grassroots community organization founded in Boston's Chinatown in 1977 to advocate for full equity and empowerment of the Chinese community in the Greater Boston area and beyond.

CPA was founded out of a series of community organizing campaigns around issues such as Chinese parents’ input into the Boston school desegregation process and organizing for community control over land development in Chinatown. In the mid-1980s, the Association worked with laid-off workers from P & L Sportswear and Beverly Rose Sportswear to establish Commonwealth-funded bilingual retraining programs. This led to the founding of the Association's Workers' Center in 1987. In the 1990s, the Association was actively involved in the debate over the development of Parcel C in Chinatown.

Today the membership is made up predominantly of Chinese immigrants and the Chinese-speaking; most are workers in low wage industries, working families, or low-income elderly. CPA has no single issue focus because it believes that people have many concerns–jobs, education, freedom from discrimination, a clean and safe living environment. CPA continues its work on tenants' rights, workers' rights, political empowerment, and local Chinatown issues, including a campaign to secure the future of Chinese and Vietnamese bilingual ballots for Boston voters. The Association has also organized translation services for new Asian immigrants, community support for victims of anti-Chinese racial violence, and a campaign to re-establish a branch library in Chinatown .

The organization has seen that once people achieve their rights in one aspect of their lives, they will be more likely to actively participate in solving other community problems.

Parcel C is a small plot of land in the heart of residential Chinatown. The area around Parcel C houses an elementary school, a community health center, a social services provider, and contains a low-income housing development for the elderly and disabled.

The history of Parcel C extends back to the time of urban renewal. A large portion of the parcel was formed when the Boston Redevelopment Authority seized and demolished the homes of several Chinese residents. After the land was taken, the Authority entered into an agreement with Tufts and New England Medical Center in which the medical institutions were given the right to buy the land. However, for over twenty years, the land lay vacant.

In 1985, New England Medical Center submitted a proposal to build an 850-car garage on Parcel C. The concept was immediately greeted with opposition by the Chinatown Neighborhood Council, City Hall’s advisory group on Chinatown matters, and the Boston Redevelopment Authority. This garage proposal was ultimately defeated.

In 1988, in an effort to preserve land for community use, the Boston Redevelopment Authority announced its decision to hand over title of the land and building to the Quincy School Community Council. New England Medical Center sued the Authority to stop the transfer of this plot of land. After a series of lawsuits, the City, Chinatown, and New England Medical Center negotiated a settlement.

The Authority promised that Parcel C would be reserved for a community center, and pledged its assistance in building this center. The Authorities first steps toward fulfilling this promise consisted of providing a $15,000 technical assistance grant and helping six community groups to incorporate as the Chinatown Community Center, Inc.