The Zen Peacemakers is a diverse network of socially engaged Buddhists, currently including the formal structures of the Zen Peacemakers International, the Zen Peacemaker Order and the Zen Peacemaker Circles, many affiliated individuals and groups, and communities formed by Dharma Successors of Roshi Bernie Glassman. It was founded by Bernie Glassman and his second wife Sandra Jishu Holmes in 1996, as a means of continuing the work begun with the Greyston Foundation in 1980 of expanding Zen practice into larger spheres of influence such as social services, business and ecology but with a greater emphasis on peace work. Eve Marko, Bernie Glassman's third wife, is a founding teacher of the Zen Peacemaker Order. Zen Peacemakers have developed from the White Plum Asanga lineage of Taizan Maezumi.

Although Zen Peacemakers are associated with the White Plum Asanga lineage, founder Bernie Glassman did not envisage it as an organization bound by traditional Japanese Sōtō Zen practice. Bernie Glassman has said:

Maezumi Roshi was not carrying out the tradition of the Japanese Soto sect when he came here. The Soto sect of Japan was not carrying out the traditions of Chinese Zen. You have to be careful with the word 'traditional.' We honor a lot of eccentric people.

Likewise, although within the lineage, the Zen Peacemaker Order was not formed as part of the White Plum Asanga organization. Links between the two organizations are now distant; despite being named as heir to the presidency of the White Plum Asanga in Maezumi's will, Glassman ceased attending the annual meetings of Taizan Maezumi's dharma heirs within a few years of his former teacher's death. According to the author James Ishmael Ford, as of 2006 Glassman has "transferred his leadership of the White Plum Asanga to his Dharma brother Merzel Roshi and has formally 'disrobed,' renouncing priesthood in favor of serving as a lay teacher and leader of what is now called the Zen Peacemaker Family."

Activities of the Zen Peacemakers originated in Yonkers, New York with the opening of the Greyston Bakery, its most well-known and prosperous project, in 1982. Its projects eventually united under the auspices of the Greyston Foundation, a network of community development companies and non-profit organizations based in the inner city. Greyston Family Inn opened in 1991, on proceeds from the sale of Greyston mansion. It provides permanent housing for homeless people, with a child day-care center amongst services available for residents. Currently, there are three buildings, providing fifty housing units. Other projects include the Greyston Garden Project, five community-run gardens established on neglected properties. In 1992 Greyston Health Services was formed, primarily to provide services for poor people with HIV/AIDS. In 1997 Issan House opened, named after Issan Dorsey a Zen Roshi who had died from an AIDS-related condition in 1990. It provides thirty-five permanent housing units for people living with both HIV/AIDS and mental illness or chemical dependency. The Maitri Day Program within the building provides a variety of health and rehabilitative service to 150 people with HIV/AIDS from the local community. As one of the first 'welfare to work' programs in the US, in 2004 Greyston had an annual budget of over $20 million and received numerous government grants. At Yonkers, they occupy the former Ethan Flagg House-Blessed Sacrament Monastery, added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1998.

In 1996 Bernie Glassman - with his wife Sandra Jishu Holmes - officially founded the Zen Peacemaker Order, later the Zen Peacemaker Circle and currently Zen Peacemakers. According to professor Christopher S. Queen, "The order is based on three principles: plunging into the unknown, bearing witness to the pain and joy of the world and a commitment to heal oneself and the world."

Zen Peacemaker projects have included a Paris soup kitchen for immigrants and non-violence efforts in the Palestinian territories, with joint Israeli-Palestinian peaceful coexistence projects in Israel. Zen Peacemakers in Poland established 'Nonviolent Communications Training and Practice' in the national public school system and opened an AIDS hospice. The Auschwitz project brought together families of the Holocaust survivors and the descendants of those who ran the camps to '"bear witness to the horrors of war" during retreats at the site of the former German concentration camp in Poland. In the United States, Zen Peacemakers have campaigned for prison reform, provided hospice care and worked with the poor in both inner-city and rural areas.

Zen Peacemakers have 70 affiliate centers in 5 Continents and 12 Countries. Countries with groups affiliated to Zen Peacemakers include Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Germany, Ireland, Mexico, the Netherlands, Switzerland, and the UK. In the United States affiliates include the Upaya Institute and Zen Center led by Joan Halifax in Santa Fe, New Mexico.