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Recent literature on the role of the state in high-tech industrial development argues that the main attribute of a successful developmental state since the 1990s was its global and local network structure. In addition, the role of the state is to empower stakeholders and facilitate cooperation among them in policymaking process. However, they fail to consider the roles of political system and the different political processes behind them in affecting the nature of political transactions and cooperation among political actors. In contrast to those writers, I argue that special attention needs to be paid to how the overall working of political institutions with its specific historical trajectory affects state-industry-science relations in information technology sectors. I apply a transaction cost politics approach to understand the ways in which political institutions affect the transactions that political actors are able to undertake, and the evolution of state-industry-science embeddedness that emerge. This approach is illustrated through a comparative analysis on the different development trajectories of three horizontal technology policies (R&D support, network policy, and venture capital formation) in Finland, Taiwan and Korea. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]