This volume gathers most of the lectures and communications presented at the meeting t held in Bordeaux from the 27th to the 29 h of September and entitled "Far from equi- librium: instabilities and structures". This meeting is part of a series of seve- ral other interdisciplinary conferences such as Elmau 1972, London 1974, Dortmund 1976, Elmau 1977, Tokyo 1978. The old science classification scheme proposed by Auguste Comte tends to be eve- ry day...