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Processes of rationalisation and restructuring within the international drug industry in the past decade have altered the conditions for governance of Australia’s pharmaceutical sector. This thesis demonstrates that the balance of power within the domestic policy network shifted to favour multinational suppliers of prescription drugs after the Government in the late 1980s embraced the objective of making the regulatory and policy environment more user-friendly. The emphasis of state activities has moved away from welfare and public interest objectives towards provision of direct support for capital accumulation under conditions of globalising capitalism. / The domain of pharmaceutical policy was historically characterised by corporatist bargaining between strong regulatory agencies within the Commonwealth Department of Health and centralised associations representing producer and professional interests. Following recent reform of these agencies and a reordering of their relative authority, the pattern of interaction within the policy network has become more open and politicised, with more active participation of groups representing consumers, patients and the research and development (R&D) community. Conversely, the capacity of Australian state agencies to manage and control sectoral change has diminished. A greater degree of pluralism at the level of interaction between the state of interest groups has evolved within the context of the principal trend towards marketisation and commodification within the drug sector. / These conclusions arise from the empirical analysis of developments in the international pharmaceutical industry, including the formation of a transnational regulatory regime, and changes in domestic policy and regulatory practices. The thesis traces the ascendance of governance through the market mechanism at the expense of direct state control or corporatist bargaining. The investigation gives particular attention to: the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme; the Pharmaceutical Industry Development Program introduced in 1987, notably the Factor (f) scheme (which provides notional drug price increases in exchange for expanded industry activity); and the politics of brand substitution and generic drugs. / It is shown that the Australian Government in the period under consideration, irrespective of party political composition, has pursued purposefully a policy of international integration derived from an acceptance of the imperative of retaining and attracting foreign capital. While the Factor (f) program as designed to sustain bargaining between the state and the multinational industry, it is demonstrated that the Department of Industry proved unable to maintain and generate support for strategically oriented industry policy. / The changes identified and analysed in this thesis are consistent with the hypothesis of a hollowing out of the state associated with the decline of the Fordist model of accumulation and the Keynesian welfare state. A feature of this transition is the subordination of social policy to the imperatives of innovation, flexibility and international competitiveness.