"What is peace and how should it be defined? In this timely and compelling study, Oliver Richmond traces the discourses of peace from philosophical and theoretical debates in international relations to the politics and practices of an 'epistemic' community of peacebuilding actors operating in conflict zones. In a radical critique of the dominant paradigm of peace, he examines its components and its short-comings in the context of a variety of post-Cold War peace operations and associated peace-building projects, which have involved the importation of expertise into conflict zones."--Jacket.