In the second half of the twentieth century, a number of researchers have conceptualized modern society as a social system composed of differenti ated yet interrelated institutional spheres. Commonly identified institu tional spheres are the family, religion, the economy, the polity or state, medicine or health care, religion, law, and education. The institutional perspective has sometimes been linked to a structural-functional frame work; it has often been asserted that institutions must be understood as parts of a larger whole operating at the societal level. Equally important have been...