Islam and Economic Policy

To what extent do Islamic values have implications for economic policy making?

Islamist political parties have enjoyed unprecedented election victories in recent times. The Islamic Revolution in Iran, the election of the Justice and Development Party in Turkey and the coming to power of Islamists, albeit briefly, after the Arab Spring, has changed the political landscape in the Middle East and has ramifications for the entire Muslim World. Yet the continuing success of these parties depends on their record on economic development and employment creation. Are their economic policies different from those of their autocratic predecessors? Have they been influenced by the writings of academic Islamist economists? This book looks at the impact of Islamic teaching on public economic policy and asks how Islamic economics differs from mainstream micro and macroeconomics.

Professor Rodney Wilson was the founder of the Islamic finance programme at Durham University in the United Kingdom where he continues to be an Emeritus Professor. He was a Visiting Professor at the Qatar Faculty of Islamic Studies in from 2009 untill 2012 and since 2013 has been an Emeritus Professor at the International Centre of Education in Islamic Finance (INCEIF), Kuala Lumpur. Professor Wilson was awarded the IDB prize in Islamic banking in 2014 in recognition of his academic work on the subject.