diff --git a/org.springframework.context/pom.xml b/org.springframework.context/pom.xml
index c127ea1f05..7212476ca5 100644
--- a/org.springframework.context/pom.xml
+++ b/org.springframework.context/pom.xml
@@ -80,6 +80,7 @@
 			<artifactId>aopalliance</artifactId>
 			<version>1.0</version>
 			<scope>compile</scope>
+			<optional>true</optional>
 		</dependency>
 		<!-- common logging dependency is in spring-core -->
 		<dependency>