We developed this special issue around the theme of decolonization broadly, emphasizing how coloniality and neo-colonial thought are woven through and still affect higher education. Through this issue, we provided an opportunity for authors (faculty, researchers, practitioners, students, and administrators) to express their vision of what a decolonized global health field looks like.

At the heart of the decolonization of global health processes lies critical analysis of the interdependent matrices of power dynamics. As characterized by the articles in this special collection, reform of global health education can take the form of shifts in leadership structures, priority setting processes, knowledge/cognitive paradigms, financial arrangements, and curricular innovation.

Our curation process of this special collection was designed to represent diverse geographies, scales, stakeholders, and themes within the decolonizing global health conversation. The unique perspectives of scholars representing the fields of pharmacy, physiotherapy, medicine, nursing, social work, law, public health, sociology, and bioethics are included in the collection. The premise of the special collection is the understanding that meaningful progress toward decolonization must come from within the institutions that built the field of global health in the first place and doing so will require deep reflection on the role different disciplines - working both alone and collaboratively - to advance decolonization.