This volume contains the Proceedings of the Twelfth French-German-Spanish Conference on Optimization held at the University of Avignon in 2004. We refer to this conference by using the acronym FGS-2004. During the period September 20-24, 2004, about 180 scientists from around the world met at Avignon (France) to discuss recent developments in optimization and related fields. The main topics discussed during this meeting were the following: 1. smooth and nonsmooth continuous optimization problems, 2. numerical methods for mathematical programming, 3. optimal control and calculus of variations, 4. differential inclusions and set-valued analysis, 5. stochastic optimization, 6. multicriteria optimization, 7. game theory and equilibrium concepts, 8. optimization models in finance and mathematical economics, 9. optimization techniques for industrial applications. The Scientific Committee of the conference consisted of F. Bonnans (Rocqu- court, France), J.-B. Hiriart-Urruty (Toulouse, France), F. Jarre (Diisseldorf, Germany), M.A. Lopez (Alicante, Spain), J.E. Martinez-Legaz (Barcelona, Spain), H. Maurer (Miinster, Germany), S. Pickenhain (Cottbus, Germany), A. Seeger (Avignon, France), and M. Thera (Limoges, France). The conference FGS-2004 is the 12th of the series of French-German meetings which started in Oberwolfach in 1980 and was continued in Confolant (1981), Luminy (1984), Irsee (1986), Varetz (1988), Lambrecht (1991), Dijon (1994), Trier (1996), Namur (1998), Montpellier (2000), and Cottbus (2002).
