Governing Technological Entrepreneurship in China and the West

China’s effort in the past two decades to develop technological entrepreneurship by means of establishing science parks and business incubators is unique in terms of both its large scale and the speed with which this has been achieved. This paper attempts to contribute on the understanding of China’s technological entrepreneurship promotion programs by positioning their policies and practice against an international context where the governance model appears to show much variation. Distinctive features identified for China after a broad comparison, however, draw attention to two major discrepancies between policy discourse and practice: 1) contrary to the claims of central policy makers that science parks were established to help nurture capabilities in domestic corporations, it has becoming increasingly clear that foreign direct investment (FDI) is considered the key to their success; 2) instead of being embedded in the local milieu as an interface for R&D, industry and education, technology transfer and commercialization in business incubators still heavily rely on funds and subsidies from the central government, and thus barely contribute to local entrepreneurship development.