The free energies of the conformal field theories dual to charged adS and rotating adS black holes show Hawking-Page phase transition. We study the transition by constructing boundary free energies in terms of order parameters. This is done by employing Landau's phenomenological theory of first order phase transition. The Cardy-Verlinde formula is then showed to follow quite naturally. We further make some general observations on the Cardy-Verlinde formula and the first order phase transition. (C) 2003 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. References: 21
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