The International Federation of Actors (FIA) is a global federation of performers’ trade unions, guilds and professional associations. Founded in 1952, it represents several hundreds of thousands of performers with some 90 member organisations in more than 60 countries around the world. FIA’s main purpose is to voice the professional interests of actors (in film, television, radio, theatre and live performance), broadcast professionals, dancers, singers, variety and circus artists and others. Internationally, FIA works on any subject matter that may impact on the working lives of the professionals it represents. It advocates to improve the working conditions and advance the economic and social rights of performers, but also to campaign for the value of the cultural and creative sector in which they work.

Its main objectives include:
– Developing and promoting the organisation of performers worldwide and working with member unions to meet the challenge of organising in a fast-changing industry and employment landscape;
– Lobbying and advocacy work at international level in order to bring the voice of performers into policy-making on topics as diverse as social security and taxation; health and safety; trade policy; artistic freedom; cultural diversity; gender equality; professional mobility; intellectual property and others;
– Safeguarding and promoting the intellectual property rights of performers and working to ensure that they can deliver a meaningful return in an increasingly digitalized world;
– Promoting networking and solidarity among its membership : the exchange of resources and expertise between its members is one of FIA’s great strengths. The federation seeks to promote such networking through regular meetings, congresses, projects, capacity-building work and twinning agreements, as well as good communication in general. FIA has a key role in conveying and coordinating international solidarity to member unions involved in industrial disputes;
– Being a resource and point of reference for its membership for useful information pertaining to the international level: on issues like mobility, employment standards in other countries, co-productions etc. But also compiling expertise and resources on issues that impact on the lives of performers worldwide, such as, for example, the protection of child performers, the moral rights of performers, work-life balance in the live performance and audiovisual sectors, etc.;
– Advocating for the value of the cultural and creative sector and for the need for strong public policy and financing to ensure cultural diversity, a diverse audiovisual sector, a flourishing live performance sector and a strong commitment to freedom of artistic expression;
– Representing its members in key international fora : as an NGO, FIA enjoys permanent consultative and participatory status with the World Intellectual Property organisation (WIPO); the International Labour Organisation (ILO); UNESCO, the OIF (Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie), the Council of Europe and the European Audiovisual Observatory, where it conveys the professional interests of the performers it represents. At EU level, FIA is a recognised representative European social partner in both the live performance and audiovisual sectoral social dialogue committees, with a full mandate to represent its members.

The Federation also includes several regional and linguistic groups, whose members meet regularly to discuss issues of common interest and also to feed into the global policy of the Federation (the four FIA regional groups are the African group: AfroFIA, the European group: EuroFIA, the Latin American group: FIA-LA, and the North American group: FIA-NA).

FIA is a member of the International Arts and Entertainment Alliance (IAEA), together with the International Federation of Musicians (FIM) and UNI MEI, the trade union international for workers in the Media, Entertainment and Arts. The IAEA is itself a member of the Council of Global Unions (CGU) and is recognised by the ITUC as a Global Union Federation.