Janet Mancini Billson, PhD, CCS
GDI Director
As founder and Director of Group Dimensions International, Billson has consulted for over 35 years in organizational development, international development, resettlement, and social policy. She is known for deftly bringing out both practical and theoretical analyses of qualitative data drawn from key informant, executive, and focus group interviews. Her clients include foundations, hospitals, universities, and government agencies in Canada and the U.S; the World Bank Group, the Inter-American Development Bank, and the African Development Bank; Canada’s International Development Research Centre; and the World Food Program, UNESCAP, and UNWomen. She recently conducted a qualitative study to evaluate the World Bank’s Group’s Global Gender Strategy and another study to assess the IFC’s investment role in private education in developing countries. She also conducted a rapid research study, “What Works in Higher Education? An Analysis of Indicators Supported by Research,” for the Independent Evaluation Group, World Bank.
Billson’s previous work in education has included evaluation of STEM field programs offered through Brown and Harvard universities to transition high school students into university,Billson is former Professor of Sociology and Women’s Studies at Rhode Island College and The George Washington University (where she continues as Professorial Lecturer). She received her graduate degrees in Sociology from Brandeis University under Woodrow Wilson and NIMH Field Work Fellowships.She has lectured widely on women in development, female well-being,refugee resettlement, and the Millennium and Sustainable Development Goals.Billson is the recipient of several national awards in applied sociology, including the Lester F. Ward Distinguished Contributions to Applied and Clinical Sociology Award, the Stuart A. Rice Career Achievement Award, the Lifetime Award for Sociological Practice, and Alumni of the Year Award, Baldwin-Wallace College. She has lectured widely on women in development, female well-being, refugees, resettlement,and the Millennium and Sustainable Development Goals. Her keynote speech for the 2019 AACS Annual Meeting focused on the Sustainable Development Goals as a roadmap for sociological practice.As a Visiting Scholar at the Well-Being in Developing Countries Research Group, University of Bath, and Honorary Research Fellow, University of Exeter, England, Billson has developed a clear focus on international development, refugee policy issues, and the concept of well-being. She is currently an External Affiliate, Centre for Refugee Studies, York University, Toronto, and an Affiliate Member of the Canadian-American Center, University of Maine, Orono. She was named Killam Visiting Professor in Canadian Studies, Minnoch Center for Global Exchange, Bridgewater State University (2021).Author of several books on identity, marginality, resettlement, and social change, Billson’s recent work includes:Refugee Pathways to Freedom: Escaping Persecution and Statelessness (Bloomsbury, 2024);Refugee Pathways to Peace: Escaping the Chaos of War (Bloomsbury, 2025);People of Peace: The Doukhobor Search for Freedom in Canada (University of British Columbia Press, 2026).
She is also author of: Keepers of the Culture: The Power of Tradition in Women’s Lives, based on interviews with indigenous, immigrant, and religious minority women in Canada, and co-author of: Female Well-Being: Towards a Global Theory of Social Change with Carolyn Fluehr-Lobban;Inuit Women: Their Powerful Spirit in A Century of Change with Kyra Mancini;and Cool Pose: Dilemmas of Black Manhood in America with Richard Majors.Consulting work has taken Billson to over 40 countries, which has given her a broad view of global issues, global compacts, and the international bodies that are meant to address them. Born and raised in Hamilton, Ontario, she spent her adolescence in British Columbia. At 16, she moved to Washington, DC, where her father was posted with the Canadian Army. She is a dual Canada-US citizen and lives in Saco, Maine.