In today's context of global crisis and uncertainty, a study on the impact of globalization on civil servants may seem far removed from reality. Yet, while the COVID-19 pandemic has shown the limits of globalization in the form of vaccine nationalism and border closures, it has also, once again, shown its potential in terms of helping to save lives and improve livelihoods, through the global COVAX initiative and its roll out. Reviews of responses to the crisis have highlighted the need for more rather than less global action, and a greater role for transnational actors in addressing global issues. Additionally, the pandemic has reinvigorated the global debate on other issues, such as climate change, where there is also a renewed urgency for action. Hence, while the current global crisis may lead to a focus on different aspects of globalization (health and climate) to what we primarily discuss here (economic and governance), to us it is likely that the influence of globalization on the day-to-day work of civil servants will increase as a result. This of course will evolve more clearly in the years to come.

The origins of this work predate the current global crisis, and arose from a literature and source review done in the context of developing the Oxford Handbook of Global Policy and Transnational Administration (Stone and Moloney, 2019). One of the conclusions of this review (Raadschelders and Verheijen, 2019) was that the literature on the impact of globalization on civil servants is very sparse, and that there is a significant research agenda to be covered, especially in empirical research. This volume is our initial effort to begin building an empirical research base to understand the scope of the nature of ‘influencing and being influenced’ between national civil servants and transnational actors. To us, this is an important topic that needs far more attention, as an aspect of global governance that will determine the success of our ability to cope with the key global challenges of tomorrow and today, starting with meeting the objectives set out in the UN (United Nations) Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).