Odessa Gonzalez Benson

Dr. Odessa Gonzalez Benson is an Associate Professor at the University of Michigan School of Social Work and a key figure in the Detroit School of Urban Studies. Her research spans refugee resettlement, state-civil society relations in migration, labor migration, and epistemic justice in social welfare studies. She leads the Just Futures Action Research Lab, focusing on capacity-building for refugee-run community organizations in Michigan.

• 2017 PhD in Social Welfare, University of Washington
• 2010 MSW, Arizona State University
• 1999 BA in Communications, University of the Philippines-Diliman

Her work critically examines U.S. refugee policies, including placement strategies, labor regulations, and neoliberal discourses, while exploring how refugee-led organizations navigate legitimacy and participatory urban governance. Recent publications analyze the impact of the pandemic on organizational fields and the role of cultural-legal brokering in gender relations during resettlement. She serves on the editorial board of the Social Service Review and has received the 2024 Doctoral Student Organization Faculty Award. Her research is funded by the Michigan Institute for Clinical Research and the Gilbert Whitaker Fund Grant.