Accelerating processes of economic globalization have fundamentally reshaped the organization of the global economy towards much greater integration and functional interdependence through cross‎-border economic activity‎.‎ In this interconnected world system‎,‎ a new form of economic organization has emerged‎:‎ Global Production Networks ‎(‎GPNs‎)‎‎.‎ This brings together a wide array of economic actors‎,‎ most notably capitalist firms‎,‎ state institutions‎,‎ labour unions‎,‎ consumers and non‎-government organizations‎,‎ in the transnational production of economic value‎.‎ National and sub‎-national economic development in this highly interdependent global economy can no longer be conceived of‎,‎ and understood within‎,‎ the distinct territorial boundaries of individual countries and regions‎.‎ Instead‎,‎ global production networks are organizational platforms through which actors in these different national or regional economies compete and cooperate for a larger share of the creation‎,‎ transformation‎,‎ and capture of value through transnational economic activity‎.‎ They are also vehicles for transferring the value captured between different places‎.‎ This book ultimately aims to develop a theory of global production networks that explains economic development in the interconnected global economy‎.‎ While primarily theoretical in nature‎,‎ it is well grounded in cutting‎-edge empirical work in the parallel and highly impactful strands of social science literature on the changing organization of the global economy relating to global commodity chains ‎(‎GCC‎)‎‎,‎ global value chains ‎(‎GVC‎)‎‎,‎ and global production networks ‎(‎GPN‎)‎‎.‎