Continuing a 26-year history, the 14th Symposium on Fusion Technology, hosted by the Euratom-CEA Association, was held in the Palais des Papes at Avignon from 8 to 12 September 1986. This papal palace, dating back to 1335, is one of France's most impressive historical monuments. It provided an imposing and stimulating setting for the conference, which was attended by almost 500 scientists from 18 countries and four continents. About 275 invited and reviewed contributed papers were presented, covering the conference topics as shown in Table I. The number of papers was 11% greater than that for the 13th SOFT. The greatest increase occurred in topics relating to reactor technology; in keeping with the state of the art, however, contributions on plasma technology continued to dominate.