These institutionally derived categories fall short of clarity and comprehensiveness. Some social processes occur within the framework of every institutional process. Thus the settlement of disputes is a prominent characteristic of government as we know it; but it is not, and never has been, and cannot by the nature of things be, a monopoly of government when government is defined as an institutional division of social labor. No institution ever quite monopolizes the function which it most distinctively exercises. But this need not lead to confusion. When the settlement of disputes is a prominent function of one group in society, and there is no other group which participates in the same function in the same degree, there is no hesitation in deciding to call the first group the “governors” and to call the patterns according to which they are selected and operate the “political or governmental” institutions of the community. If there is a rival adjuster of differences, the distinction is by no means clear, as when the “church,” “business,” and the “state” are rivals. Perhaps the governors can be identified by finding who it is who handles the coercion employed in defending or extending communal enterprises, though this criterion may from time to time fail to differentiate. But, on the whole, these doubts are marginal doubts. Ordinarily it is possible to find a division of labor and a set of sentiments which can be called the “government of the state.” The marginal instances call attention to the fact to which allusion has been made, the fact that no “institutional” process quite monopolizes the function which it most distinctively exercises. It is therefore advisable to describe communal processes by two sets of terms, one of which refers to “institutions” and the other to “functions” which are found within the various institutional frameworks. Much of the literature of social science consists in terminological quibbles about the “proper” words to use in this institutional or functional sense, often without appreciating the essential nature of the matter at issue. It is, of course, of the highest importance to understand the difference, and of minor importance to agree upon the words with which to describe the distinction.