Abstract. The article traces evolution of the U.S. international development assistance (IDA) policy and analyzes its present institutional system and trends in its funding structure. Traditionally, development assistance is linked to current and pressing foreign policy priorities. As the United States systematically carried out international development assistance for the past seven decades, its IDA policy evolved through stages of institutionalization, securitization, democracy promotion, and new wave of securitization in the framework of the “global war on terrorism”. The present trend point at declining importance of development assistance in the U.S. foreign policy. Yet this trend has its limits and the overall importance of IDA will remain high.