belief is not that a more modest focus on jurisdiction makes reform easy. But jurisdiction still may be the path of least resistance to reform within private international law In this great need for and relative feasibility of jurisdictional reform lies the defensible reason that the U.s. Supreme Court and international negotiators have focused so much attention on the subject. Moreover, jurisdiction could be the key that unlocks the door to a better world order and justice. Given agreement on territorial jurisdiction, coordination regarding recognition and enforcement of the resultant judgments is readily achievable. Even agreements on judicial cooperation on service and evidence become more likely, once countries are assured that only courts exercising appropriate jurisdiction can request such assistance I do concede that even feasible reform occurs only when truly need-driven, no matter how much academics desire and preach reform. But I contend that public and private needs for jurisdictional reform(and not just in specialized areas)are very real. The failure to recognize these needs--not the absence of needs--has resulted in the current dearth of treaties on the subject, as well as in the lack of federalization of the law in the united states C Nonjurisdictional Harmonization Remains Unlikely The reader who did not buy into the above-quoted idea of fostering "the national might still be struggling with this nagging question: Why pursue a jurisdictional agreement, which will not be easy to reach, rather than follow the alternative and more direct path of harmonizing the laws of different nations? Indeed, article 65(b)&(c)of the Treaty Establishing the European Community may envisage harmonizing the choice-of-law rules or civil-procedure systems of the member states.3 7 More widely, we could seek to harmonize laws across European and U.S procedural systems, whether for the possible efficiency of similarity when national judiciaries interact, for actual improvements within various nations' procedure, or even for complete effectuation of harmonized substantive law.38 Such harmonization could come either by voluntarily borrowing of transplants or by mutual agreement between systems. t Let us consider these two First, actual transplantingas opposed to the mere seeking of inspiration abroad for locally s6C. Evan Tsen Lee, The Dubious Concept of Jurisdiction, 54 HASTINGS L.J. 1613(2003)(arguing that urisdiction is not inherently different from the merits) 37See supra note 11; cf. Paul R. Beaumont, Private International Law of the European Union( May 2004) (manuscript on file with author)(taking a narrow view of art. 65 ). See generally Kevin M. Clermont, Foreword: Why Comparative Civil Procedure?, in KUO-CHANG HUANG, INTRODUCING DISCOVERY INTO CIVIL LA W at ix(2003). 39See ALAN WATSON, LEGAL TRANSPLANTS: AN APPROACH TO COMPARATIVE LAW 21-30,95-101,107-18(2d ed 1993); see also Alan Watson, Legal Transplants and European Private Law, in THE CONTRIBUTION OF MIXED LEGAL SYSTEMS TO EUROPEAN PRIVATE LAW 15 (Jan Smits ed, 2001)(responding to Legrand). But see Pierre Legrand The Impossibility of "Legal Transplan ts, "4 MAASTRICHT J. EUR. CoMP L. 111(1997) s See Konstantinos D. Kerameus, Procedural Unification: The Need and the Lim itations, in INTERNATIONAL PERSPECTIVES ON CIVIL JUSTICE 47(IR. Scott ed. 1990)10 36Cf. Evan Tsen Lee, The Dubious Concept of Jurisdiction, 54 HASTINGS L.J. 1613 (2003) (arguing that jurisdiction is not inherently different from the merits). 37See supra note 11; cf. Paul R. Beaumont, Private International Law of the European Union (May 2004) (manuscript on file with author) (taking a narrow view of art. 65). 38See generally Kevin M. Clermont, Foreword: Why Comparative Civil Procedure?, in KUO-CHANG HUANG, INTRODUCING DISCOVERY INTO CIVIL LAW at ix (2003). 39See ALAN WATSON, LEGA L TRANSPLANTS: AN APPROACH TO COMPARATIVE LAW 21-30, 95-101, 107-18 (2d ed. 1993); see also Alan Watson, Legal Transplants and European Private Law, in THE CONTRIBUTION O F MIXED LEGAL SYSTEMS TO EUROPEAN PRIVATE LAW 15 (Jan Smits ed., 2001) (responding to Legrand). But see Pierre Legrand, The Impossibility of “Legal Transplants,” 4 MAASTRICHT J. EUR. & COMP. L. 111 (1997). 40See Konstantinos D. Kerameus, Procedural Unification: The Need and the Limitations, in INTERNATIONAL PERSPECTIVES ON CIVIL JUSTICE 47 (I.R. Scott ed., 1990). belief is not that a more modest focus on jurisdiction makes reform easy.36 But jurisdiction still may be the path of least resistance to reform within private international law. In this great need for and relative feasibility of jurisdictional reform lies the defensible reason that the U.S. Supreme Court and international negotiators have focused so much attention on the subject. Moreover, jurisdiction could be the key that unlocks the door to a better world order and justice. Given agreement on territorial jurisdiction, coordination regarding recognition and enforcement of the resultant judgments is readily achievable. Even agreements on judicial cooperation on service and evidence become more likely, once countries are assured that only courts exercising appropriate jurisdiction can request such assistance. I do concede that even feasible reform occurs only when truly need-driven, no matter how much academics desire and preach reform. But I contend that public and private needs for jurisdictional reform (and not just in specialized areas) are very real. The failure to recognize these needs—not the absence of needs—has resulted in the current dearth of treaties on the subject, as well as in the lack of federalization of the law in the United States. C. Nonjurisdictional Harmonization Remains Unlikely The reader who did not buy into the above-quoted idea of fostering “the national genius” might still be struggling with this nagging question: Why pursue a jurisdictional agreement, which will not be easy to reach, rather than follow the alternative and more direct path of harmonizing the laws of different nations? Indeed, article 65(b) & (c) of the Treaty Establishing the European Community may envisage harmonizing the choice-of-law rules or civil-procedure systems of the member states.37 More widely, we could seek to harmonize laws across European and U.S. procedural systems, whether for the possible efficiency of similarity when national judiciaries interact, for actual improvements within various nations’ procedure, or even for complete effectuation of harmonized substantive law.38 Such harmonization could come either by voluntarily borrowing of transplants39 or by mutual agreement between systems.40 Let us consider these two routes. First, actual transplanting—as opposed to the mere seeking of inspiration abroad for locally