Fixed point actions and on-shell tree-level Symanzik improvement

In this paper it is argued that the properties of the fixed point action of a renormalization group transformation can be used to implement the on-shell tree-level Symanzik improvement of lattice actions to any given order in the expansion in the lattice spacing, in a way which does not involve any perturbative calculations. In particular, a well-known technique for the lowest order improvement of SU(N) lattice gauge theories is revisited from the point of view of fixed point actions, which allows to shed light on some subtle points.