Mathematics

In this paper we recover the non-perturbative partition function of 2D Yang–Mills theory from the perturbative path integral. To achieve this goal, we study the perturbative path integral quantization for 2D Yang–Mills theory on surfaces with boundaries and corners in the Batalin–Vilkovisky formalism (or, more precisely, in its adaptation to the setting with boundaries, compatible with gluing and cutting–-the BV-BFV formalism). We prove that cutting a surface (e.g. a closed one) into simple enough pieces–-building blocks–-and choosing a convenient gauge-fixing on the pieces, and assembling back the partition function on the surface, one recovers the known non-perturbative answers for 2D Yang–Mills theory.