The Empire of AI Comes to Texas: Data Centers, Coloniality, and Resistance in Texas, Chile, and Beyond, by Angela Valenzuela, Ph.D.

The Empire of AI Comes to Texas: Data Centers, Coloniality, and Resistance in Texas, Chile, and Beyond

by 

Angela Valenzuela, Ph.D.

Link

May 30, 2026

When Erin Brockovich recently observed on MSNBC that "people aren't being heard" in the rush to build AI data centers across the United States, she identified a problem that extends far beyond environmental regulation. 

Her concern goes to the heart of democracy itself: Who gets to decide how land, water, energy, and public resources are used in the name of technological progress? And whose voices matter when those decisions are made? 

For Texans, these questions are becoming increasingly urgent as the state emerges as one of the nation's leading centers of AI infrastructure development (MSNBC, 2026).

According to Brockovich's AI Data Center Reporting Project, Texas hosts approximately 464 data centers that are either completed or in process, making it one of the nation's leading hubs for AI infrastructure (Brockovich AI Data Center Reporting, 2026; also see UT News, 2026). 

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At the same time, Texas reportedly leads the nation in citizen complaints submitted through her website concerning the impacts of data centers on local communities. Residents have raised concerns about water consumption, strain on electrical grids, noise pollution, environmental degradation, tax incentives, and the lack of transparency surrounding proposed developments (Brockovich AI Data Center Reporting, 2026; Gillette, 2026).

The map created by Erin Brockovich. 

brockovichdatacenter.com

To understand why these concerns are resonating so deeply, Karen Hao's recent book, Empire of AI (2025), offers an invaluable framework. Her reporting from Chile is particularly illuminating. There, communities challenged proposed hyperscale data centers that would consume substantial quantities of water in regions already suffering from prolonged drought. Residents found themselves confronting not merely technical questions but political ones.

Similar to Texas and other states where such centers are getting developed, top-down decisions affecting local resources, drinking water quality, loss of land and so on were often justified through narratives of modernization, innovation, and economic necessity, while those most directly affected struggled to gain meaningful influence over the process (Hao, 2025).
Hao challenges the popular image of artificial intelligence as a largely immaterial force existing somewhere in "the cloud." In reality, AI depends upon vast material infrastructures—data centers, electrical grids, water systems, mining operations, and labor networks that stretch across the globe. Every single AI request relies on physical resources that must be extracted, transported, consumed, and maintained.

What is perhaps most striking is that opposition to these projects is increasingly bipartisan. As highlighted in recent MSNBC coverage, residents from across the political spectrum are questioning whether communities are being asked to absorb disproportionate environmental and economic costs in exchange for promises of innovation and economic growth (MSNBC, 2026). 
In a political era defined by polarization, this convergence is noteworthy. As concerns over water scarcity, infrastructure demands, and local control intensify, the politics of AI infrastructure could become an important issue in future elections.

Recent research from the University of Texas at Austin projects that data centers could account for between 3 and 9 percent of Texas's total water consumption by 2040 (UT News, 2026). In a state already grappling with recurring drought, aquifer depletion, and increasing competition for water resources, these projections warrant careful public scrutiny. This is especially true in Central Texas, where population growth, climate uncertainty, and development pressures are already placing extraordinary demands on finite water supplies.

Yet environmental concerns alone do not fully capture what is at stake.

What Hao's work helps us see is that AI infrastructure may represent a contemporary expression of what Peruvian sociologist Aníbal Quijano (2000) termed the coloniality of power. Coloniality refers to the persistence of colonial forms of domination long after formal colonial rule has ended. It shapes whose knowledge counts, whose labor is valued, whose resources are extracted, and whose interests prevail in decisions about development.

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Historically, empires extracted silver from Latin America, rubber from the Amazon, cotton from the American South, and oil from colonized territories throughout the world. Today, the resources being extracted may appear different. Yet the underlying logic remains recognizable. The AI economy depends upon water, energy, land, public subsidies, data, and labor. The benefits frequently accrue to distant investors and technology firms, while local communities are often left to absorb environmental risks and infrastructure burdens.

This does not mean that artificial intelligence itself is inherently harmful. Nor does it mean that technological innovation should be rejected. The issue is not whether AI should exist. The issue is whether communities have a meaningful voice in determining how AI infrastructure is developed and governed.

This is where the concept of transformational resistance becomes especially useful.

In their seminal work, Solórzano and Delgado Bernal (2001) distinguish "transformational resistance" from other forms of opposition by emphasizing its critical awareness of structural inequality and its commitment to social justice. Transformational resistance is not simply reactive. It combines critique with collective action aimed at creating more equitable social arrangements.

More recently, Valenzuela, Unda, and Mena Bernal (2025) have extended this framework in their analysis of resistance to Texas Senate Bill 17 and the dismantling of diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives in higher education. We maintain that transformational resistance emerges when communities move beyond defending existing institutions toward imagining and constructing alternative democratic futures grounded in solidarity, collective agency, and the protection of the public good.

Viewed through this lens, communities raising questions about AI infrastructure are not merely opposing particular projects. They are advancing alternative visions of development rooted in democratic participation, ecological responsibility, and collective well-being. Their efforts remind us that technological progress should not be measured solely by computational power, market valuation, or economic growth, but also by whether it strengthens our capacity to care for one another and for the shared resources upon which our futures depend (Solórzano & Delgado Bernal, 2001; Valenzuela et al., 2025).

At stake is more than water consumption or energy demand. The deeper question concerns our collective obligations to resources that sustain community life across generations. Aquifers, watersheds, electrical grids, and public infrastructure are not merely inputs into an economic system. They are foundations of collective life. 

When decisions regarding their use are driven primarily by private interests while risks are borne by the broader public, citizens are right to ask whether the burdens and benefits of development are being distributed fairly.

This is why Brockovich's reporting initiative is so important. Her project does more than catalog complaints. It creates a public record of community concerns. It validates local knowledge. It elevates voices that might otherwise remain invisible within highly technical regulatory processes. In so doing, it helps democratize a conversation that too often unfolds behind closed doors.

The lesson emerging from both Chile and Texas is that technological futures are not inevitable. They are political choices.

The question before us is not whether artificial intelligence will shape the future. It already is. The question is whether that future will be organized around principles of extraction or stewardship, concentration of power or democratic participation, private gain or public responsibility.

We should be stunned—not because artificial intelligence exists, but because one of the most resource-intensive technological transformations in modern history is unfolding with so little public awareness and deliberation.

From Chile to Central Texas, communities are challenging the assumption that technological development should proceed without democratic consent. As Erin Brockovich reminds us, people deserve to be heard. 

The growing resistance to unaccountable AI infrastructure reflects a broader demand for transparency, stewardship, and meaningful public participation in decisions that affect collective well-being. At its core, the debate over AI data centers is not simply about technology. It is about who gets to decide, whose voices matter, and whether the future will be imposed upon communities or built with them.

The future of AI should not be determined solely by corporations, investors, engineers, or policymakers. It must also be shaped by the communities whose lives, resources, and futures are implicated in its development.

References

Brockovich AI Data Center Reporting. (2026). AI data centers & our communities. https://www.brockovichdatacenter.com

Bureau of Economic Geology. (2025). Water requirements for data centers in Texas [White paper]. The University of Texas at Austin. 

Gillette, S. (2026, May 28). Erin Brockovich launches map to track controversial AI data centers, which reportedly cost $25B in environmental damages last year. People. https://people.com/erin-brockovich-launches-map-track-ai-data-centers-11985676

Hao, K. (2025). Empire of AI. Penguin Random House.

MSNBC. (2026, May 28). Erin Brockovich on AI data centers: "People aren't being heard" [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9hQLn5MbsEI

Quijano, A. (2000). Coloniality of power, eurocentrism, and Latin America. Nepantla: Views from South, 1(3), 533–580. https://muse.jhu.edu/article/23906

Solórzano, D. G., & Delgado Bernal, D. (2001). Examining transformational resistance through a critical race and LatCrit theory framework: Chicana and Chicano students in an urban context. Urban Education, 36(3), 308–342. https://doi.org/10.1177/0042085901363002

UT News (2026, May 6). Data centers are growing in Texas, but big questions remain about water use. University of Texas at Austin News. https://news.utexas.edu/2026/05/06/data-centers-are-growing-in-texas-but-big-questions-remain-about-water-use/

Valenzuela, A., Unda, M. D. C., & Mena Bernal, J. J. (2025). Disrupting colonial logics: Transformational resistance against SB 17 and the dismantling of DEI in Texas higher education, Ethnic Studies Pedagogies. https://www.ethnicstudiespedagogies.org/gallery/Vol3-Issue1-03_DisruptingColonial.pdf

"Neoliberalism’s End Game: Accumulation by Another Name," by James B. Greenberg

Friends,

James B. Greenberg—Professor Emeritus of Anthropology, founding editor of the Journal of Political Ecology, and former president of the Political Ecology Society—has authored a searing and brilliantly articulated exposé of a system devouring itself—and us.

Neoliberalism, as he lays bare, is not a deviation from capitalism but its most predatory form. There is, for example, feminist economics as an alternative, especially the work of renowned Nancy Folbre (2006), who advances the notion of a “care economy”—a model that is antithetical to neoliberalism.

Greenberg names what too many still refuse to confront: neoliberalism isn’t failing—it’s succeeding with a ferociousness and on its own brutal terms. From extractive economics to temporal looting, he draws incisive connections between austerity, the climate crisis, and racial capitalism with anthropological rigor and moral urgency. 

This is more than critique—it is a call to reclaim imagination, rebuild solidarity, and fight for a livable future.

-Angela Valenzuela

Reference

Folbre, N. (2006). Measuring care: Gender, empowerment, and the care economy. Journal of Human Development and Capabilities, 7(2), 183–199. https://doi.org/10.1080/14649880600768512

Neoliberalism’s End Game: Accumulation by Another Name
How Market Logic, Structural Scarcity, and Political Abandonment Are Hollowing Out the Future


James B. Greenberg Substack
Jun 27, 2025

The old promises are collapsing. Growth no longer lifts all boats—it lifts yachts. Progress no longer means shared prosperity—it means shareholder returns. What we’re witnessing isn’t a system in crisis; it’s a system reaching its logical conclusion. Neoliberalism was never about efficiency or freedom. It was about transferring public wealth into private hands while dressing the theft in the language of merit and inevitability.

We’re now living in its endgame.

Every domain of life is being made extractable—our labor, our attention, our data, our ecosystems, even our grief. Where public institutions once existed to buffer risk and extend care, they’ve been gutted, outsourced, or rebranded as markets. What’s left is a politics of managed precarity, where the illusion of choice masks deepening dependence on volatile systems.

Control no longer needs to announce itself with force. It’s embedded in systems we’re told are neutral. It works through spreadsheets, billing codes, and risk scores—quiet mechanisms that control without appearing to rule.

Anthropology has long studied systems of exchange, reciprocity, and redistribution. Neoliberalism offers their inverse: a world where every need becomes a payment plan, every right becomes a subscription, and every crisis becomes an opportunity for someone else to profit. The commons—whether land, water, health, or education—are being enclosed anew, not with walls but with pricing tiers and contractual exclusions. The dispossession is as subtle as it is ruthless.

But the extraction isn’t just material. It’s temporal. What neoliberalism extracts is the future itself. Delayed transitions, deferred maintenance, stalled climate action—these are forms of temporal looting. The system generates short-term profits by mortgaging long-term stability. Every unmet obligation, every deferred repair, every “not yet” becomes a mechanism for robbing the next generation of options they never had a chance to claim. This is extraction across time, not just space.

The logic of this moment isn’t only economic—it’s ecological. Political ecology reminds us that systems of power are embedded in landscapes, infrastructures, and flows of energy and capital. Extraction is not confined to oil rigs and clearcuts. It is structured into zoning laws, data centers, insurance markets, and eviction courts. Accumulation by dispossession has become accumulation by design—a regime that doesn’t just seize opportunity, but manufactures scarcity in order to profit from it.

Look closely, and you’ll see the pattern. The same firms underwriting fossil fuel expansion are buying up water rights, farmland, and housing. The same actors slashing climate funds are cutting Medicaid and food assistance. The billionaires rebranding as technocrats are buying influence, shaping regulation, and engineering predictive models of your behavior. In this new economy, you are not just a consumer—you are a datafied asset, evaluated for risk, monetized through surveillance, and expected to perform in real time.

What looks like failure is often functioning exactly as intended—a system designed not to serve, but to extract.

Climate denial, austerity, deregulation, border militarization, and corporate greenwashing aren’t isolated tactics—they are components of a coherent toolkit. Together, they protect capital from accountability by dispersing blame and disorienting the public. But behind every market correction and manufactured crisis is the same imperative: protect capital at all costs, even if it means rendering entire communities—and ecosystems—uninhabitable.

And we know where it leads.

Across the country and the globe, we see sacrifice zones multiply. These are not accidents of neglect—they are the continuation of colonial logic turned inward. Flint. Jackson. Pine Ridge. Standing Rock. Gaza. Places where extractive industries and militarized policing converge, where public health collapses and no one is held accountable. These are domestic frontiers, where the violence of empire is repatriated and masked as budgetary constraint.

The lines are drawn by insurability. Those deemed too costly to protect are left to absorb the damage: rising premiums, evictions, unlivable heat, chemical spills, food deserts. In this system, insurance becomes the new passport—a gatekeeper of risk that determines not just what you can afford, but whether you can belong.

The ideology that sustains this is not neutral. It’s racialized, gendered, and historically rooted in conquest. The fossil fuel regime isn’t just an energy system—it’s a worldview. One that insists prosperity requires no limits, that nature is inert, and that markets are moral arbiters. Anthropologically, it is a cosmology of domination—one that crowds out other ways of being, knowing, and organizing life.

But alternatives do exist. And they are not hypothetical.

Across Indigenous and land-based communities—from the Amazon to the Arctic—are models of reciprocal governance, ecological stewardship, and collective care. These aren’t relics of the past. They are systems of survival honed over millennia. The fact that they are ignored or actively undermined is not a coincidence. It is part of the same colonial logic that demands control, even at the cost of collapse.

Neoliberalism thrives on exhaustion. It teaches us to fear rather than imagine, to hustle rather than organize, to consume rather than care. Its most insidious achievement isn’t privatizing services—it’s shrinking the horizon of what we imagine to be possible.

But that, too, can be reversed. Systems endure because they are reproduced—and they can be dismantled the same way.

The fight ahead is not simply about policies or elections. It’s about unmaking a worldview that sees life as extractable, inequality as natural, and solidarity as a threat. A livable future won’t come from tech fixes or carbon markets alone. It will come from shifting the underlying logic—from profit to reciprocity, from scarcity to care, from collapse to repair.

Neoliberalism may not end with fire and fury. It may fade, hollowed out by its own contradictions. But what rises in its place will depend on how ready we are—not just with critique, but with vision.

Because the real endgame isn’t theirs.

It’s ours to reclaim.

Suggested Readings

Auyero, Javier, and Debora Swistun. Flammable: Environmental Suffering in an Argentine Shantytown. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009.

Davis, Mike. Planet of Slums. New York: Verso, 2006.

Greenberg, James B., and Thomas K. Park, eds. Terrestrial Transformations: Political Ecology of Our Planetary Crisis. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2020.

Harvey, David. A Brief History of Neoliberalism. New York: Oxford University Press, 2005.

Klein, Naomi. This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2014.

Scott, James C. Seeing Like a State: How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Condition Have Failed. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1998.

Wacquant, Loïc. Punishing the Poor: The Neoliberal Government of Social Insecurity. Durham: Duke University Press, 2009.