Using a qualitative and a case study approach, this paper examines the role of the Malaysian universities and their social relationships with government and industry in the light of the statist, laissez-faire and hybrid characters of the Triple Helix model. Most Malaysian universities are positioned within the statist and laissezfaire variants of the Triple Helix model, where the government is invariably a dominant actor. Overall, universities in Malaysia have made efforts to see social relationships evolve; however, there are still issues to be addressed and difficulties to be overcome with respect to such questions as commercialisation and procedures that would need to evolve within the university for transition to hybrid Triple Helix culture to take root.

This article examines the linkage between entrepreneurship and the making of popular culture in East Asia. The central argument presented here is that the notion of entrepreneurship is central for understanding and conceptualizing the process of constructing trans-national markets for popular culture and for building new circles of ‘Asian’ recognition. In other words, entrepreneurial vision is not only transforming the local cultural markets by underpinning a region-wide cultural production system but also un-intentionally spurring feelings of ‘Asian’ sameness. The study itself focuses on four cases of entrepreneurship which exemplify the driving forces and the intended and unintended consequences of entrepreneurship, and outlines the wider theoretical and methodological implications for this concept by defining the relations between structural determinism and human agency in popular culture.