The 'institutional' mode of analysis also facilitated a critical analysis of the claim to be found in some of the academic medical law literature that ethical issues arising in the course of medical practice and from applications of technological developments in biomedical science should be determined outside of medicine and science, and that the most appropriate site for this ought to be the law. Focusing on how judges organize and exercise their power in cases whose subject matter involves difficult, and contentious, ethical issues, it was argued that the courts are very reluctant to become embroiled in discussing such issues. To conclude, there is a need to complement an analysis of the factors underlying the undeniable expansion of the courts' jurisdiction in this area with a corresponding study of how that jurisdiction has been, and is being, asserted, or exercised, in practice.