This volume explores the rapidly evolving relationship between the state and higher education in Europe and in East Asia through a combination of empirical studies, secondary analyses and personal observations from many of the leading scholars in the field of comparative education studies. A scenario emerges where the state seeks to encourage stakeholder influence, while, at the same time, acts to moderate such influence in order to ensure that wider objectives are satisfied; markets are controlled, elements of demand and supply are manipulated and funding is targeted to meet particular policy priorities through a model that is described as ‘controlled stakeholder steering’ which offers a new explanation of the relationship between the state and higher education, certainly in the countries addressed in this book.