HarperCollins Publishers
Data Empire: The Power of Information to Organize, Control, and Dominate by Roopika Risam
Published in July 2026
Higher ed—and everyone else—are in the middle of a big conversation with ourselves about artificial intelligence. Perhaps we should also be talking about data, because the two conversations, data and AI, go together. AI is many things, but among its superpowers (and super-risks) is its potential to make meaning from big—and unstructured—data. Data fuels AI, and AI can help make sense of data. From a university perspective, we are entering an era in which we will capture, analyze and utilize much more data across all campus operations and initiatives.
This sounds like a good thing. Who is against data-driven decision-making? And then I read Data Empire.
Among the (many) wonderful things about this book is that its author is a professor at my university. There is something so cool when a book that breaks through in the national conversation (hello, Obama’s summer favorites!) was written by a person at your school. It feels more immediate and possible that the author can apply the book’s lessons to our institution’s work.
What Data Empire does so effectively, and why I think the book is a must-read addition to our campus AI discussions, is provide deep historical grounding for how data can be both a means of control and disempowerment as well as a mechanism for advancement. Today, we worry about the risks posed by a few large tech companies collecting vast amounts of data on our spending and consumption behaviors. That—legitimate—worry about our data privacy, however, is best contextualized by understanding that data collection and control have always been mechanisms through which power, be it state or corporate, is accumulated and solidified.
Bringing Data Empire back to our campus context and our university AI debates, the book made me question my thinking about the power differentials in our communities. As Risam documents across history, data is never neutral. Those with the power to collect, control and own the data do so in service of their own goals. Seldom do the masters of data stop to ask which individuals and groups might be disempowered or damaged by its collection, dissemination or utilization.
My hope is that Data Empire contributes to the discussion on my campus (and yours) by connecting institutional AI diffusion to data governance while foregrounding issues of power. I’m interested in how we can leverage AI to integrate currently discrete and unconnected data sources to advance institutional effectiveness. And at the same time, after reading Data Empire, I’m curious as to who in my community will benefit as we increasingly rely on AI to make data-driven decisions.
Sometimes, a really good book can make you think differently about a topic you’ve been thinking lots about. For me, Data Empire has me rethinking where the future of AI might take us as a tool to do the work of the university. There is enough in this wonderful book that you might find yourself thinking differently about questions you’ve been pondering.
What are you reading?
