After a foreword by Neal Ascherson, the introduction provides some autobiographical information about Ucko and sketches his personal view of the place of the WAC in the field of archaeology.

The chapter argues that much fundraising was shambolic, but narrates that Ucko succeeded in prompting relevant parties to offer sufficient underwriting for the event.

Chapter 2, "Academic Planning", sketches Ucko's view that the WAC, and archaeology more generally, needed to be more global both in intellectual outlook and in participation.

It offers detailed accounts of various WAC organising meetings, growing press interest, and rapidly shifting willingness of different academics to participate in the Congress in view of the boycott.

It offers a chronological account of shifting allegiances and Ucko's efforts to enable extensive Third- and Fourth-World representation in Paris.

The book concludes with eleven appendices: abbreviations, a glossary, a chronology, a reprint of the Revised World Archaeological Congress Second Announcement, a chart of the organisational structure of international academic bodies mentioned in the text, a list of the International Executive Committee of the IUPPS, a list of the members of the WAC's Executive Committee and Board of Directors, a list of the countries represented at the WAC, a copy of a 9 February 1987 letter from Ucko to the UNESCO Non-Governmental Organisations Unit seeking to establish UNESCO's role in determining IUPPS policy on South Africa, a message from Anti-Apartheid, and suggested revisions by the WAC Steering Committee of the IUPPS statutes.

[1] Other criticisms included alleged misleadingly selective quotation[2] and omission of details that shed a less favourable light on Ucko's position (e.g. Polish archaeologists, refusing to attend in solidarity with South Africans, being forced to by their government, and sending a token representative in response);[3] a lack of recognition of the experience of Nazi occupation in forming the views of Continental European actors on academic freedom;[4] and scepticism at Ucko's claims that he had not planned on using the WAC as a platform for anti-apartheid views all along.

J. Desmond Clark wrote that the book is 'interesting as a detailed account of how a determined individual dealt with what promised to be a difficult situation in such a way as to give the impression, however erroneous, of being the organizer of a humanitarian crusade'.