The Great Recession of 2008/2009 and ensuing policy responses put an end to a sustained phase of relative macroeconomic stability and rapid globalisation. The financial crisis and the turbulences that followed gave rise to a new wave of enquiry into the drivers or resilience that allow regions to withstand, and recover from, such external shocks, or which even enable the region to gain from such shocks by initiating new growth paths. In parallel, the digital transformation continues to push technological boundaries, reviving assertions such as the death of distance or the end of geography from the early days of the internet. The pandemic and the return of geopolitics put a brake on hyper-globalisation, potentially strengthening clusters in advanced economies through reshoring. The demands on clusters to contribute to addressing all these challenges are rising. But what determines if clusters prove helpful or harmful in times of crisis, and how can experiences from the crisis inform the evolution of cluster policies? The contributions in a brand-new special issue edited by RUB’s Matthias Kiese, Christian Ketels of the Stockholm School of Economics and Dirk Fornahl from the University of Jena address the resilience of clusters and cluster policies alike. By investigating the influence of specialisation and sectoral composition on the resilience of German regions during the Great Recession and that of ambidexterity on the resilience of clusters, two contributions shed new light on how clusters strengthen the resilience of regions. The other two papers illustrate the potential of CSR and the digital transformation to rejuvenate cluster policies.