ABSTRACT
This chapter provides some conceptual, theoretical and empirical clarifications of private', public' and its shifting divide from a sociological point of view, including some working definitions. It also provides some minimalist moral and legal principles and recommendations in order to discuss whether and if so, what kinds of intervention in religious associations or organizations are compatible with the guarantee of associational religious freedoms from the perspective of the political theory of liberal-democratic constitutionalism. The chapter discusses these issues, the varying and shifting legal status of these associations and organizations as either private' or public' or something in-between is not irrelevant but clearly not exclusively decisive. It explores with some comments and suggestions on spheres or spaces in which different kinds of publics then do different things. The chapter focuses on the tensions between the protection of associational freedoms of non-governmental religious schools and legitimate concerns of public regulation and control.
