Researching the connections between infrastructure, peacebuilding, environmental change, and urban resilience.

Assistant Professor at George Mason University and author of Peace Infrastructures (MIT Press, 2026).

featured book

How UN Peace Operations Build Roads, Bridges, and Solar Farms in the Pursuit of Sustainability

MIT Press, 2026

The first comprehensive account of infrastructure building in United Nations peace operations, examining how roads, bridges, energy systems, and other public works have become part of contemporary peacebuilding efforts.

Peace Infrastructures examines how UN peace operations build roads, bridges, power systems, and other infrastructure in pursuit of sustainability, resilience, and peacebuilding.

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current research

I research how infrastructure shapes peacebuilding, environmental change, and urban life in conflict-affected settings. My work focuses on infrastructure planning, resilience, reconstruction, and sustainability in contexts of conflict and disaster.

selected publications

  • Kollar, Justin, and Silvia Danielak. 2026. “Planning Conflict in the Age of AI Infrastructure: Governing Data Center Growth in the United States.” Journal of the American Planning Association 0 (0): 1–14. https://doi.org/10.1080/01944363.2026.2720635.
  • Danielak, Silvia, and Meredith McKittrick. 2026. “Imagining Infrastructure, Encountering Friction: Green Hydrogen Development in Morocco and Namibia.” Political Geography 131 (December): 103653. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.polgeo.2026.103653.
  • Danielak, Silvia. 2025. “Post-Military Futures: Plans and Failure of the Peace Operations’ Infrastructure Handover in Darfur.” Journal of Intervention and Statebuilding 19 (5): 567–85. https://doi.org/10.1080/17502977.2025.2480153.
  • Danielak, Silvia. 2019. “Navigating Urban Encounters: An Infrastructural Perspective on Violence in Johannesburg’s Taxi Industry.” Third World Thematics: A TWQ Journal 4 (2–3): 137–57. https://doi.org/10.1080/23802014.2019.1647795.

get in touch

For research collaborations, speaking engagements, media inquiries, or student supervision, please get in touch.

sdaniela @ gmu.edu | GoogleScholar | ORCID