ABSTRACT

This chapter provides a global perspective on the changes that have taken place in the role of the state. An examination of the state owned enterprise sector, as an aspect of profit-making state entrepreneurship. There is no unambiguous definition of the 'welfare state'. Writing in the heyday of the welfare state, R. Titmuss referred to it as an 'indefinable abstraction' with which he was 'no more enamored today' than he had been two decades earlier. It is clear that there is a need for new terminology to be developed to better convey the nature of the state and conceptualize the reconfiguration of the role of the state in this new era. The strategically focused state industry and innovation policy of South Korea is worth drawing attention to since it epitomizes how society can do much to stimulate or inhibit development of entrepreneurship. Since 1999, with the first Labour-led centre left Coalition Government, New Zealand began era in policy reconfiguration.