This chapter explores the institutional environments in which standards for the service sector are expected to support the rise of a global knowledgebased economy. The analysis relies on global political economy approaches to extend to the area of services standards the assumption that the process of globalisation is not opposing states and markets, but a joint expression of both of them including new patterns and agents of structural change through formal and informal power and regulatory practices. It analyses how services standards gain authority in the institutional environment in Europe and in the United States and the extent to which this authority is recognised at the transnational level. In contrast to conventional views opposing the European and American standardisation systems, the chapter shows that institutional developments of services standards are likely to face trade-offs and compromises across those systems.