We study the universal critical behaviour near weakly first-order phase
transitions for a three-dimensional model of two coupled scalar fields -- the
cubic anisotropy model. Renormalization-group techniques are employed within
the formalism of the effective average action. We calculate the universal form
of the coarse-grained free energy and deduce the ratio of susceptibilities on
either side of the phase transition. We compare our results with those obtained
through Monte Carlo simulations and the epsilon-expansion.Comment: 8 pages, 4 figures in eps forma
