Shaping the Field of Contestation: Institutional Alignment and Governance in the Hyperscale Data Center Industry

The rapid expansion of hyperscale data centers as the infrastructural backbone of artificial intelligence is transforming not only physical landscapes but also patterns of civic governance. This paper examines how the hyperscale development industry shapes the field of contestation through mechanisms of managed participation and institutional alignment around growth. While such projects are often framed as inevitable engines of economic growth, residents experience them as imposed, opaque, and exclusionary forms of development. Drawing on qualitative case studies, I conceptualize hyperscale data centers as locally unwanted land uses (LULUs) embedded within asymmetric governance regimes. I show that hyperscale developers use pre-emptive institutional alignment and reactive litigation strategies to shape the field of legitimacy and contestation around the planning and governance of these projects, overriding democratic and regulatory processes. Mechanisms of procedural hollowing and discursive control constrain contestation, limiting the ability of citizens to participate and challenge these projects in their communities. The result is a governance environment which favors technological development, shaping the field of contestation by leaving limited room for substantive challenge. The paper contributes to broader debates on infrastructure, governance, and democratic participation by demonstrating how emerging digital-industrial forms reproduce and intensify longstanding inequalities in land use decision-making, as hyperscale data centers generate highly visible conflicts that illuminate the shifting terrain of local governance under conditions of global technological expansion.