The place of religion in public education : theoretical considerations

Abstract

This PhD thesis, entitled ‘The Place of Religion in Public Education: Theoretical Considerations’, aims at answering the following question: ‘what should be the permissible room for religion in modern public education under the principle of neutrality’. The fundamental nature of this question requires a structuring and theorization of the interaction between religion and public education in two interrelated theoretical steps. The first step clarifies the general principles (or approaches) guiding the interaction of religion with public education, which are the principle of cooperation and the principle of accommodative neutrality; the latter clarifying the general degree of cooperation between religion and public education. The second step identifies and constructs the dimensions of this relationship, which are ‘freedom’, ‘interest’, ‘instruction’ and ‘support’. In this regard, while considering the permissible room for religion in public education, the primary research question of this thesis aims at setting up a theoretical platform from which one can reason and argue any religious issue or claim that emerges in the course of public education. Hence, this research examines and re-designs those important principles, concepts and notions, and provides an integrated theoretical platform which allows solving all issues linked to religion in public education. This thesis is methodologically grounded in the idea that, in order to deal with religious claims in public education, legal or political arguments are not enough. It is also crucial to integrate valid arguments from philosophy of education, philosophy of religion, sociology of religion, sociology of education, pedagogy, history, or anthropology. Hence, a coherent theorization of the relations between religion and public education mandates a distinct theoretical platform, which would not only include political theory or jurisprudential arguments, but also those of philosophers of education and religion, sociologists, pedagogues, historians, and anthropologists, to name a few. Any other answer to this question would be necessarily partial and unsatisfactory.