Conflict Assessment and Peacebuilding Planning: Toward a Participatory Approach to Human Security. By Lisa Schirch. Boulder, CO: Kumarian, 2013. 229 pp., $22 paperback (ISBN: 978-1-565-49579-1). Lisa Schirch's ambitious handbook tackles complex challenges of contemporary peacebuilding in an accessible format. By providing “easy-to-use conceptual frameworks for seeing and learning about the complex, dynamic conflict system” (p. 1), Schirch's volume sets out to respond to problems of “untested assumptions and lack of assessment” (p. 1), and of coordination and harmonization among diverse peacebuilding actors, by contributing “more coherent terminology and foundational concepts linking academic sources and practitioner tools” (p. 2). All this and more is wrestled with through a “whole of society” approach that engages both government and civil society (p. 27) and can be applied at multiple scales from local urban or remote communities to policy-making elites at national and global levels (p. 2). To advance this ambitious agenda, Schirch advocates a broad systems approach that attends to the interplay of conflict drivers and “mitigators” through self-reflexive conflict assessment research, peacebuilding design and planning based in theories of change, and a welcome focus on monitoring and evaluation. The handbook is also borne of recent debates and preoccupations in the peacebuilding field, as reflected in its focus on human security, advocacy of local participation, and attention to questions of culture …