Rebecca Hanson

Rebecca Hanson is an Assistant Professor at the University of Florida with a joint appointment in the Department of Sociology and Criminology & Law and the Center for Latin American Studies. Her research critically examines how policies aimed at reducing inequality and violence paradoxically exacerbate these issues, focusing on policing, state-building, and 21st-century violence modalities in Venezuela and Colombia. She is a leading voice in qualitative methods and ethnographic inquiry, particularly regarding power dynamics in fieldwork.

• Books: Policing the Revolution (Oxford University Press, 2025), co-editor of The Paradox of Violence in Venezuela (2022), and co-author of Harassed: Gender, Bodies, and Ethnographic Research (2019).
• Research Collaborations: Metaketa Initiative IV, Post-Conflict Security Structures in Latin America, and transitional justice in Venezuela.
• Public Sociology: Regularly contributes to media outlets like New York Times and The Conversation on Venezuela’s security policies, migration, and authoritarian trends.
• Academic Leadership: Director of UF’s International Ethnography Lab, advancing fieldwork methodologies.

Recent Publications highlight her work on police reform, community policing efficacy, maternal responses to militarization, and gendered violence in research. Her peer-reviewed articles span journals like Science, Latin American Research Review, and Violence: An International Journal, with a focus on Venezuela’s evolving security landscape and participatory governance.