Abstract: "Justice sector reforms have frequently been based on institutional transplants, wherein the putatively ?successful? legal codes (constitutions, contract law, etc.) and institutions (courts, legal services organizations, etc.) of developed countries have this been imported almost verbatim into developing countries. Local level context and the systems of justice actually operating in many contexts were largely ignored. As such, justice sector reformers have failed to acknowledge, and thus comprehend, how the systems-which, at least in rural areas, are predominantly customary, idiosyncratic to specific sub-regional and cultural contexts, and residing only in oral form-by which many people (if not most poor people) in developing countries order their lives function. This paper attempts to bring customary systems into central focus in the ongoing debate about legal and regulatory reform. It first analyses the ongoing challenges and critiques of customary legal systems and examines why, despite these challenges, engaging with such systems is crucial to successful reform processes. It then turns to an examination of the ways in which customary systems have developed in three African Countries-Tanzania, Rwanda and South Africa-and how governments in each of these countries have tried to deal with different systems. Finally the paper draws out some of the lessons of these experiences and the implications they might have for ongoing policy reform initiatives."