Dr Claire Bessant

Associate Professor

Department: Northumbria Law School

Dr Claire Bessant joined Northumbria University’s School of Law in 2002 having made the decision to move to academia from private practice where she worked as a solicitor specialising in family law. She has since published in the fields of family law, privacy law, data protection, information sharing and human rights, and has contributed to government and parliamentary consultations, on both domestic violence and online privacy.

Claire is a member of the Society of Legal Scholars and has recently been elected to the Society of Legal Scholars Executive Committee, with her appointment running from 1 October 2023 until 30 September 2026. She is a member of the Socio-Legal Studies Association. She is a mentor for the SLSA's pilot mentoring scheme and with colleagues at Northumbria is co-organising the SLSA's PGR conference 2024. Claire is also a member of the Association of Internet Researchers and the International Society of Family Law.

At Northumbria, Claire is a member of the Law and Society Research Group and the Gender, Violence and Abuse Interdisciplinary Research Theme.

Claire’s teaching currently focuses upon information law (including data protection, access to environmental information and inter-agency information sharing for child protection purposes). Claire has also led the postgraduate research skills module and has taught on the undergraduate and postgraduate Childcare Law and Family Law modules and on the undergraduate distance learning English Legal Systems module.

Claire is currently PGR Lead for Northumbria Law School. She has previously undertaken a variety of administrative roles including Faculty Director of Programme Approvals and Review, Director of Education for Postgraduate Law Programmes and Director of Education for Law.

Claire is a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, a reviewer for the National Teaching Fellowship Scheme and has sat as an expert member on several panels considering the validation of a number of law-related programmes at other institutions.

Claire is joint Managing Editor of the open-access Journal of Law, Technology and Trust.

Campus Address

Room 309, City Campus East

Newcastle Upon Tyne
NE1 8ST

Email Claire

Research Themes and Scholarly Interests

Much of Claire's research explores how family privacy impacts upon the law in practice. Family privacy is here understood as an ideology which protects the family from the intervention of state and society and enables the family (notably parents) to take decisions about the family and children’s upbringing. Claire's doctoral thesis titled 'Parental Views about the Importance of Family Privacy and its Protection in English Law'used empirical methods to explore parents’ understanding of family privacy and the laws protecting such privacy. The thesis proposes a new framework for understanding the relationship between family, state and society and a new definition of family privacy which reflects both how parents understand the term and jurisprudential views on the family and how it should be protected from state and society. Claire is currently working on a monograph, to be published by Routledge, Family Law, Privacy and Ideology, which will explore the application of this framework in practice, and consider how the law currently operates to protect the family's privacy from state, individuals and big tech.

Claire's research on family privacy has been used to provide a new perspective to discussions regarding children's privacy, online harms, and the role parents and Government should play in protecting children from such harms (chapter currently in press). Claire is also currently undertaking empirical research exploring educators' understanding of the legal obligations imposed upon them where children are at risk of/have suffered female genital mutilation, again using family privacy as a lens through which to explore the state's role in protecting vulnerable family members.

Claire's research also explores the impact of technology upon children's privacy. Claire's research on 'sharenting' (a term used when parents share information about their children online) and the legal remedies afforded to children in the UK whose information is shared online by their parents was published in Communications Law in 2018. Her consideration with Dr Maximillian Schnebbe of the application of the UKGDPR and EUGDPR to the phenomenon of shareting was published in Datenschutz und Datensicherheit in 2022. During 2021-2 Claire worked with an international, interdisciplinary team of academics to develop further understanding of the sharenting phenomenon, the benefits that sharenting brings and the risks that it poses, with a view to identifying further avenues for research and developing policy recommendations. This research forms the basis of a recent publication “Sharenting in an Evolving Digital World: Increasing Online Connection and Consumer Vulnerability” in the Journal of Consumer Affairs.

Claire's interests in exploring the impact of digital technologies upon children has also led to another international collaboration which is currently exploring parents' awareness of dark design, an intentionally deceptive user interface designed to manipulate users, including children, into certain behaviours, including the sharing of their personal information.

In 2020-21 Claire formed part of the Observatory for the Monitoring for Data-Driven Approaches to Covid-19 (OMDDAC), a collaboration between Northumbria University & the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), funded by AHRC to research data-driven approaches to Covid-19. Claire led on OMDDAC's research with young people which asked 'Are young people aware of how data (including their own personal data) has been used during the pandemic and if so, what views do they hold about its use?' The findings and recommendations drawn from this research are now available in the European Journal of Law and Technology: Children, Public Sector Data-Driven Decision-Making and Article 12 UNCRC

Key Publications

Please visit the Pure Research Information Portal for further information
Data-Driven Decision-Making Beyond COVID-19: Incorporating the Voice of the Child, Bessant, C., Allsopp, R. 12 May 2023, Pandemic and beyond, Manchester, Manchester University Press
Children, Public Sector Data-Driven Decision-Making and Article 12 UNCRC, Bessant, C. 30 Sep 2022, In: European Journal of Law and Technology
Does the GDPR offer a solution to the ‘problem’ of sharenting?, Bessant, C., Schnebbe, M. 1 Jun 2022, In: Datenschutz und Datensicherheit
Sharenting in an Evolving Digital World: Increasing Online Connection and Consumer Vulnerability, Ong, L., Fox, A., Cook, L., Bessant, C., Gan, P., Hoy, M., Nottingham, E., Pereira, B., Steinberg, S. 1 Sep 2022, In: Journal of Consumer Affairs
Sharenting in an Evolving Digital World: Increasing Online Connection and Consumer Vulnerability, Ong, L., Fox, A., Cook, L., Bessant, C., Gan, P., Hoy, M., Nottingham, E., Pereira, B., Steinberg, S. 9 Jun 2022, 2022 AMA Marketing and Public Policy Conference, United States of America, American Marketing Association
Should I post photos of my children online? Here’s what new parents need to know about sharenting, Bessant, C. 20 Oct 2022
‘Data: a new direction’: Response to consultation: Written submission from Dr Claire Bessant, Bessant, C. 18 Nov 2021
Data-driven decision-making: Exploring Children's Views, Bessant, C. 13 Oct 2021, People, Data & the Pandemic: launch of OMDDAC's final project report
'Data-driven decision-making: Exploring Children's Views', a presentation given at 'Lessons for Future Data and AI Policy', an event hosted by the Observatory for Monitoring Data-Driven Approaches to Covid-19 (OMDDAC) at the Royal Overseas League, Bessant, C. 2 Nov 2021
Data-Driven Responses to COVID-19: Lessons Learned: OMDDAC Research Compendium, Allsopp, R., Bessant, C., Dawda, S., Ditcham, K., Emmett, C., Higgs, M., Janjeva, A., Li, G., Sutton, S., Warner, M., Oswald, M. 12 Oct 2021

Current and Recent Projects

Please visit the Pure Research Information Portal for further information
COVID-19: Observatory for Monitoring Data-Driven Approaches to COVID-19, Oswald, M. (Principal Investigator), Bessant, C. (Co Investigator), UK Research and Innovation, 04/11/20 - 03/11/21, £406,656.00
The Listening Fund, Bessant, C. (Principal Investigator), The Blagrave Trust, 01/04/18 - 31/03/19, £7,387.00

Professional Activity

Please visit the Pure Research Information Portal for further information
Organising a conference, workshop, ...: Sexual Autonomy, Identity, and Protection in Adult Care Setting funded by the Modern Law Review 2023
Other: Member UKRI Talent Peer Review College (PRC). 2023
Other: Joint recipient of Modern Law Review Seminar funding 2023
Examination: External Examiner 2022
Other: Peer review of grant application undertaken for Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) 2022
Other: Peer review of applications submitted to Call 1 of Northumbria's Internal Funding Scheme 22/23 2022
Organising a conference, workshop, ...: Gender Based Violence: Reflections on the world envisaged in “After Dark” by Jayne Cowie 2022
Other: Recipient of 2022 ACR-AMA Grant on Transformative Consumer Research 2022
Participating in a conference, workshop, ...: Pandemic and Beyond: Ethics, Law and Decision-Making during Covid-19 2022
Other: Submission to Human Rights Act Reform: a Modern Bill of Rights 2022

PGR Supervision

Marianne Matthews Storage limitation in data protection laws: Irish charity archives, the right to be forgotten, and a right to be remembered? Start Date: 06/09/2022
Noeleen Redmond Divorce in Ireland, its impact on the Family Business: A legal perspective Start Date: 06/05/2021
Caroline Hood Social Mobility and Widening Participation in the Legal Profession: can a solicitor apprenticeship programme delivered in the North-East of England act as a vehicle for local legal organisations to advance this social agenda?’ Start Date: 16/05/2019