Abstract: Based on the historic experience of making nation powerful in education, Japan has been always emphasizing the foreign aid and provided a large number of foreign aid of higher education by accepting foreign students, implementing technical cooperation, providing free assistance and yen loans. As environment of higher education in developing countries has changed, all levels of education required comprehensive development, the rise of knowledge economy called for talents of science, and higher education management and regional cooperation needed aids. Therefore, Japan’s foreign aid policy coordinated comprehensively the relationship between higher education and other levels of education, focused on the role of priority of science and the importance of management assistance, and emphasized the regional cooperation of the higher education of developing countries. The higher education aid of Japan characterized recipient countries’ real need as the logical starting point, the rise of knowledge economy as the background and software aid as the main content. The essence of Japan’s aid is to serve its national political strategy and construction of national soft power.

Key words: Japan, higher education, foreign aid