For the last half-century the direction of travel for business has been towards more globalisation. The world has been steadily integrating, governments shrinking, markets opening, and borders coming down. The march of the rules-based international system seemed unstoppable. This consensus is breaking down. Barriers to business are back in vogue. Businesses are strong-armed into doing what politicians want. Economic policies are being weaponised, protectionism legitimised and borders rebuilt. The pandemic is not responsible for this change, but it has super-charged the trend and given governments a pretext to step back in. This will herald shorter supply chains, travel curbs and more tightly controlled borders, not to mention aggressive tax policies to replenish the public purse. Shearwater was founded to help navigate this new world. Shearwater is new, but the ties that bind its founding staff are not. We have worked closely together for many years – in business, in government or across the negotiating table. We have held top jobs in politics and public administration in Britain, Europe, Australia and the United States. We have come together now because we believe our combined perspectives can help business rediscover its voice in British, European and global policy-making. The battle to beat the pandemic has shown that the big challenges of our time can only be solved through collaboration, with business being closely involved. We work with clients, regulators, politicians and other actors to ensure big policy goals go hand in hand with economic growth. Our advice to clients is based on decades of watching close-up how the world’s most powerful people talk to one another. We help make our clients players, not just spectators, in that conversation. We do not lament a lost age. We operate in the world as it is now, a world that is straining the relationship between nations but also between public bodies and the private sector.