Makino Atsushi is a professor of lifelong learning in Graduate School of Education, The University of Tokyo, Japan. He is also a visiting professor of East China Normal University, Liaoning Normal University and Minzu University of China and so on. He is one of executive directors of Japan Education Research Association and The Japan Society for Studies in Adult and Community Education.

He has been involved in the reform of administrative system and educational system, especially lifelong learning system of Japan’s national and local level government. He is strongly interested in the development of lifelong learning in the context of Japan’s social change and the emergence of the concept of key-competences or core-competences in the context of Japan’s society as de-centralizing and diversifying society.