Elizabeth Beck
Professor | Principal Investigator Professional Excellence Program, School of Social Work- Biography
Dr. Elizabeth Beck is a professor in the School of Social Work at the Andrew Young School of Policy Studies. Her primary research interests encompass anti-oppression/liberation, mass incarceration, restorative justice, community development, and forensic social work. Recently, she has integrated these themes, focusing on restorative justice as a tool to address youth violence and promote community development. As a Fulbright Scholar in 2011, Dr. Beck used her expertise to aid in establishing the first Master of Social Work program in the West Bank.
Dr. Beck has authored 30 peer-reviewed articles, one law review article, numerous book chapters, and three books. Her notable works include In the Shadow of Death: Restorative Justice and Death Row Families, which earned the American Library Association CHOICE Award for Outstanding Academic Title of 2007, and Social Work and Restorative Justice: Skills for Dialogue, Peacemaking, and Reconciliation, an edited volume exploring restorative practices in social work, both published by Oxford University Press. Her 2018 book, The Homelessness Industry: A Critique of U.S. Social Policy, published with Lynne Rienner Press, critiques how U.S. neoliberal policies contribute to homelessness by framing it as a medical rather than social justice issue. She also published a 2022 article in Contemporary Justice Review on restorative justice in prisons, co-authored with incarcerated students, which embodies her commitment to emancipatory pedagogy.
From 2006-2010, Dr. Beck served as the Principal Investigator (PI) for the Georgia Council for Restorative Justice, examining Defense-Initiated Victim Outreach, a restorative justice strategy often used in death penalty cases. Since 2011, she has led the Professional Excellence and Child Welfare Training Collaborative; since 2007, she has directed the Georgia State University School of Social Work Center for Community Social Work.
In addition to her academic roles, Dr. Beck is actively involved in community-based and forensic initiatives. She teaches at Phillips State Prison through the Common Good Atlanta program, has consulted on numerous capital cases, served as an expert in state and federal cases, and trained hundreds of capital defense teams on the impact of community violence and poverty on individual development.