Dr Francis Rees

Biography

Dr Francis Rees is a Lecturer in Law at the University of Essex and is the Co-ordinator for the Child Influencer Project, which researches the increasing practice of branded child content on social media platforms such as Youtube, Instagram and TIkTok. Child performers such as child models and actors in traditional media industries are protected, but not in the multi-million dollar influencer marketing industry. This digital child labour stems from socially normalised forms of digital parental sharing (sharenting), which results in performative child content that gains sufficient attention (usually through an audience or following) to attract brand endorsement and/or affiliations (goods/services/payment). This shortfall exposes child performers to a range of potential risks that are not provided for through any current regulatory safeguarding provisions, or practical procedures or guidelines to mitigate these risks within the advertising industry. Therefore, the Project is working with policymakers, brands and parents to raise awareness of opportunities for best practice and reform for children working in this industry. The Project has employed surveys, interviews and observations across the Republic of Ireland and the UK in order to evidence these risks and consider ways to address them. The Project evidences 20 potential risks facing children in this environment, grouped across 6 categories; • Financial risks • Risks to their education • Health & Safety considerations • Family disruptions • Negative effects on their identity • Impacts on their dignity The Child Influencer Project website is available here: https://www.essex.ac.uk/research-projects/child-influencer-project Dr Rees is currently working on a book on Digital Child Labour, which will be published in 2026: ‘The True Cost of Digital Child Labour – A Risk Assessment for Child Influencers’. Previously Dr Rees has researched in areas of statutory authority, in consideration of the Planning Act 2008, as well as visual approaches to property law pedagogy. Her work generally applies critical perspectives, and she has applied a Foucauldian framework to her Phd thesis, as well as her current work on Instagram as a heterotopia, or 'other space'. As a member of the Socio-Legal Studies Association, Dr Rees encourages legal perspectives that combine theoretical and methodological approaches, with practical experiential or 'lived experience' research. Prior to joining the University of Essex, Dr Rees was a Senior Lecturer at the University of Westminster. She holds a PhD from the School of the Built Environment at the University of Salford, and an LLB from the University of East Anglia. She is a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, and very invested in pedagogic developments that utilise technology in an effective and engaging manner.