If, as some have argued, private higher education is now the most dynamic segment of higher education, it is also the case that its growth, partly in response to the increasing mismatch between spiralling demand and limited state capacity, is often ad hoc. The article examines the contours of this trend in Indonesia, where the balance of public and private higher education has shifted sharply over the last two decades. While the private sector has been responsible for much of the expansion in higher education, its role in relation to quality is more questionable. Indonesia's economic burdens, sharply exacerbated by the effects of the Asian financial crisis of the late 1990s, make it likely that the trend towards privatisation, including of its public institutions, will continue. Together with the current rise of trans-national higher education, however, this is only likely to sharpen existing difficulties around longstanding issues of quality, equality, and regulatory capacity.