This paper attempts to analyse how governments in Malaysia and Thailand have adopted indirect policy instruments along the lines of “corporatisation” and “privatisation” to reform higher education governance. By focusing on a few key issues related to changing state and education relationships and new regulatory arrangements when higher education service providers and funding sources are increasingly diversified in these Asian societies, this article examines whether these “state-guided” regimes are no longer relevant and have become less capable in shaping public policy formation and public sector management, particularly when their policy instruments are becoming more globally driven by “liberalising and marketising trends”.