In its capacity as the largest German funding organisation in the field of international academic cooperation, the DAAD, with considerable public funds at its disposal, simultaneously fulfils responsibilities in the fields of foreign cultural and education policy, development policy and national higher education policy, which, for its part, sees the internationalisation of research, teaching and studies as a priority goal. In addition, the DAAD performs a number of intermediary roles within the scope of Europe’s education policy – especially with regard to the European Union’s exchange and mobility programmes.

This intermediary role is reflected in the DAAD budget and in its sources of funding. However, its activities extend far beyond purely financial issues and in fact work in two directions. They offer higher education institutions the opportunity to become actively involved in Germany’s foreign cultural, education and research, and development cooperation policies. While they provide the federal political bodies with access to human and infrastructural resources within the universities which would not be available to them in this form without the DAAD. In addition, the self-governing character of the DAAD opens up room for international action, even where official government relations are subject to particular political difficulties. The state’s and universities’ understanding for these mutual interdependencies, interests and benefits generally allows them to communicate as equal partners, even in cases where academic and political aims and interests do not initially coincide.