  The degrees of freedom associated with shape fluctuations and space
orientation of atomic nuclei are analyzed with effective forces and large
configuration spaces. A pedagogical theoretical introduction to the topic of
symmetries restoration broken in the mean field approach as well as to the
concept of generator coordinate is presented. We discuss global properties,
like binding energies, two neutron separation energies and quadrupole moments,
as well as spectroscopic ones like excitation energies or transition
probabilities. The analysis covers selected examples of light and heavy nuclei,
as well as some examples from the stability line to the drip lines.
