The concepts of self-similarity and scale invariance have arisen independently in several areas. One is the study of the critical properties of phase transitions; another is fractal geometry, which involves the concept of (non-integer) fractal dimension. These two areas have now come together, and their methods have extended to various fields of physics. The purpose of this Symposium was to provide an overview of the physical phenomena that manifest scale invariance and fractal properties with the aim of bringing out the common mathematical features. The emphasis was on theoretical and experimental work related to well defined physical phenomena.
