The thesis was produced by David Vernon Williams for the University of Dar es Salaam in 1983.

Williams, a native of New Zealand, gained degrees in History and Law at the Victoria University of Wellington, a graduate degree in Law at the University of Oxford (as a Rhodes Scholar), a PhD from the University of Dar es Salaam which included an analysis of colonial legal history in New Zealand, and a Diploma in Theology at the University of Oxford. A barrister and solicitor of the High Court of New Zealand, he was employed, 1971-1991, as a legal academic at universities in New Zealand, Tasmania and England. From 1992 to 2000 he was primarily occupied as a consultant employed to undertake research on law in history and on legal issues related to the Treaty of Waitangi. The author of various articles and books on colonial and indigenous law, he has acted as an arbitrator regarding Maori-owned forestry land, was honorary legal adviser to the [New Zealand] Anglican Church and a member of the Church's General Synod. In 2001 he was appointed an Associate Professor in Law at the University of Auckland.