Non-profit associations of persons established to solve common social, charitable, cultural and other tasks take an important place in the economic, political, social life of society, along with profit associations. Thus, it is important to improve civil law regulation of relations with their participation. Current legal acts regulating non-profit organizations in general, and individual organizational and legal forms of associations of persons, including public associations, should be brought into compliance with the provisions of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation. The paper is devoted to the search for ways to solve the problem of defining the concepts used in the current legislation to designate associations of persons, the content of these concepts and relationships between them. The author substantiates that the category of a public association consolidated in domestic legislation requires clarification and determination of its relationship with the categories of an association of persons, civil-law community, legal entity and some other concepts used to designate formations performing joint activities of persons to protect common interests and achieve common goals (organization, corporation, association, etc.). The paper attempts to comprehend the concept of the public association and its relationship with other similar categories used in civil legislation. The author concludes that currently the category of public association is used in a rather narrow sense and does not cover all possible non-profit associations of persons, although it could be considered as a broader category, which would make it possible to determine the general principles of creation and operation of certain types of non-profit associations of persons, to classify them and harmonize possible organizational and legal forms of their operation, giving legal certainty to the status, primarily to the civil-law status, of various types of associations of persons.