No Condition Is Permanent, a popular West African slogan, expresses Sara Berry's theme: the obstacles to African agrarian development never stay the same. Her book explores the complex way African economy and society are tied to issues of land and labour, offering a comparative study of agrarian change in four rural economies in sub-Saharan Africa. These include two that experienced long periods of expanding peasant production for export (southern Ghana and southwestern Nigeria ), a settler economy (central Kenya), and a rural labour reserve (northeastern Zambia).

This text explores the changes and continuities in the ways people have made and exercised claims on the land in Asante, Ghana, during the colonial and postcolonial era. North America: Heinemann