We are beginning to observe the growth of Islamic finance beyond the borders of traditionally Islamic markets such as the Middle East and the Far East. The proliferation of such…
Abstract
Purpose
We are beginning to observe the growth of Islamic finance beyond the borders of traditionally Islamic markets such as the Middle East and the Far East. The proliferation of such religious financial institutions in non-Islamic and more secular markets has raised some pertinent questions about how these quasi-religious institutions brand themselves in light of the need to balance the conflation of Islamic theology with that of financial economic principles.
Design/methodology/approach
The study adopts a process-based qualitative methodology proceeded with an initial data reduction-theoretical conceptualization of the extant literature. This is followed by data display via quote research of participants’ precepts and concludes with a synthesis the extant academic conceptualizations with empirical perspectives.
Findings
The findings highlight a framework explaining the interface between Islamic and non-Islamic participation on the branding of Islamic financial institutions in the UK. The findings also set forth a need for consideration of non-religious and purely economic participation in the Islamic financial system in light of branding.
Originality/value
This study derives its incremental contribution by extending the extant academic literature on the branding and consumption of Islamic financial products and services within non-Islamic and secular markets. Furthermore, by adopting a multi-disciplinary, qualitative lens and engaging pertinent individuals within the field, the study provides a rich framework from which to explore the branding of these quasi-religious institutions and the interface between religious and non-religious consumption. This framework puts forth to the leaders of Islamic financial institutions of the between- and within-group interactions in terms of religio-financial consumption and branding.
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This paper aims to explore the significance of the 2011 uprisings in Tunisia for wider questions of democratization, interrogating in particular the question of the relationship…
Abstract
This paper aims to explore the significance of the 2011 uprisings in Tunisia for wider questions of democratization, interrogating in particular the question of the relationship between religion and politics in the aftermath of the revolutionary event. The political landscape emerging after the 14th of January Tunisian Revolution has witnessed the emergence of a new political class competing in the country’s first free democratic elections on October 23. The moderate Islamist Ennahda Party emerged victorious and obtained the majority of seats in the National Constituent Assembly. These developments in the revolutionary aftermath re-opened questions over the future of “secular Tunisia” and re-ignited the political struggle between modernist and traditionalist visions of society. As a result, religious actors have increasingly been taking to the streets alongside the general population via participation in public protests, creation of new unions and associations, presence in the media, militancy in new or pre-existent political parties, etc. In this context, this research focuses on the way in which the 2011 uprisings impacted on democratization by seeking to explain how and why religious leaders are re-emerging as influential figures in the political landscape of post-revolutionary Tunisia.
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Purpose – Turkey has undergone a major market transformation during the recent decades. This chapter seeks to explore the role of religious politics in some Turkish informal…
Abstract
Purpose – Turkey has undergone a major market transformation during the recent decades. This chapter seeks to explore the role of religious politics in some Turkish informal workers' pro-capitalistic change of heart as a response to that transformation.
Methodology/approach – The study is based on participant observation and interviews in a squatter district in Istanbul, Sultanbeyli. This is a two-phase ethnography, consisting of first-hand observations first during 2000–2002, and then in 2006. The fieldnotes are supplemented by 90 interviews.
Findings – Islamic mobilization eases the transformation of habitus in a liberalizing society and the transition from the predominance of social capital to the predominance of economic capital. I contend that the sub-proletariat's dispositions depend on (urban as well as national) historical context and articulation to political and religious movements.
Originality/value of paper – I discuss Bourdieu's study of the transition from subsistence-driven economies to market economies. The chapter points out that Bourdieu's approach to the problem of transition is more satisfactory in comparison to modernization theory and resistance studies. However, I will show that the problems Bourdieu identifies in Kabylia and Béarn (such as “fatalism of despair”) are less salient in Istanbul because of a sociopolitical movement (Islamism) that garners consent among the sub-proletarians by using religion as a disciplining force.
This paper examines the Pakistani state's shift from the accommodation to exclusion of the heterodox Ahmadiyya community, a self-defined minority sect of Islam. In 1953, the…
Abstract
This paper examines the Pakistani state's shift from the accommodation to exclusion of the heterodox Ahmadiyya community, a self-defined minority sect of Islam. In 1953, the Pakistani state rejected demands by a religious movement that Ahmadis be legally declared non-Muslim. In 1974 however, the same demand was accepted. This paper argues that this shift in the state's policy toward Ahmadis was contingent on the distinct political fields in which the two religious movements were embedded. Specifically, it points to conjunctures among two processes that defined state–religious movement relations: intrastate struggles for political power, and the framing strategies of religious movements vis-à-vis core symbolic issues rife in the political field. Consequently, the exclusion of Ahmadis resulted from the transformation of the political field itself, characterized by the increasing hegemony of political discourses referencing Islam, shift toward electoral politics, and the refashioning of the religious movement through positing the “Ahmadi issue” as a national question pertaining to democratic norms.
Philosophers and political theorists have long warned of the “perils of dogmatism” for public discourse and identified intellectual humility as a necessary corrective. Sufficient…
Abstract
Philosophers and political theorists have long warned of the “perils of dogmatism” for public discourse and identified intellectual humility as a necessary corrective. Sufficient intellectual humility encompasses at least four elements: openness to error, recognition of bias, recognition of intellectual parity in interlocutors, and avoidance of recourse to authority. Religions seem to present obstacles on all four fronts, particularly when actors embody more conservative renderings of a given religion’s repertoire. As such, a case involving different groups of religious exclusivists engaging one another on topics that directly interact their deepest faith commitments and political visions presents a useful test case for our theories of intellectual humility. This chapter considers conservative protestants engaging in public discourse with Muslims about whether or not Muslim and Christian understandings of “loving God” and “loving neighbor” have sufficient overlap to support political cooperation. The results of the dialogue effort were a mixture of controversy and cooperation. For evangelicals, the engagement produced sharp conflict and yet helped to shift the community’s plausibility structures, opening further the possibility of fruitful public discourse and strategic action in cooperation with Muslims. The analysis suggests a conceptualization of practical intellectual humility that emphasizes recognition of the other.
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Jane Wilkinson and Annemaree Lloyd-Zantiotis
Recent figures show that half the world’s refugees are children, with young people now representing more than 50 percent of victims of global armed conflict and displaced persons…
Abstract
Recent figures show that half the world’s refugees are children, with young people now representing more than 50 percent of victims of global armed conflict and displaced persons. Increasing numbers of refugee youth are entering their host nations’ compulsory and postcompulsory educational systems having experienced frequent resettlements and disrupted education, which in turn, pose major barriers for educational and future employment. The consequences of these experiences raise pressing equity implications for educators and educational systems. However, the picture is not uniformly bleak. Employing Bourdieu’s thinking tools of habitus, field and capital, Yosso’s concepts of community cultural wealth and photovoice methods, this chapter draws on studies of refugee youth of both genders from diverse ethnic and faith backgrounds, conducted in regional Australia. It examines how everyday spaces for learning, for example, church, faith-based and sporting groups and family can play a crucial role in enabling young people to build powerful forms of social and cultural capital necessary to successfully access and negotiate formal education and training settings. Its findings suggest first that everyday spaces can act as rich sites of informal learning, which young refugee people draw upon to advance their life chances, employability, and social inclusion. Second, they suggest that how one’s gender and “race” intersect may have important implications for how refugee youth access social and cultural capital in these everyday spaces as they navigate between informal learning and formal educational settings.
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Cletus Agyenim-Boateng, Sulemana Iddrisu and James Otieku
This paper aims to examine the nature of corporate governance systems in Ghanaian Family-owned Businesses (FOBs). Specifically, the study investigates the nature of boardroom…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to examine the nature of corporate governance systems in Ghanaian Family-owned Businesses (FOBs). Specifically, the study investigates the nature of boardroom decisions structures, sources of governance regulations and family roles in corporate governance.
Design/methodology/approach
Drawing on Bourdieusian perspectives of the field, capital, habitus and doxa, a case study design is used to gather detailed insights about the phenomena. Purposively, the study conducts 20 interviews with participants from 15 FOBs in Ghana. The interview data are complemented with secondary sources, such as FOB handbooks, website information, legal documents and scriptures. Subsequently, data gathered were thematically analysed.
Findings
The study finds that human actors blended traditionally tacit and legally expressed boardroom decisions structures in FOBs governance. Again, traditional values, social acceptance of religious sociology and regulatory frameworks of the field dictate corporate governance practices in FOBs. In multiple family ownerships, orthodoxy of doxa is challenged; hence, power struggles and family roles in governance depend on capital possessed by social actors.
Practical implications
To continue as a going concern, FOBs must be mindful of traditional, religious sociology of family and regulatory frameworks within the field in which they operate. This is because, without this, the going concern of FOBs becomes suspicious and highly unlikely, especially where there are multiple family ownership and generations.
Originality/value
The previous literature predominantly focussed on formal boardroom structures in addressing FOBs' corporate governance issues. Notwithstanding, family governance risk of domineering and distrust associated with traditional and relational governance mechanisms remain under-represented and inconclusive, especially in Sub-Saharan Africa.
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Sigita Doblytė and Aroa Tejero
Public willingness to pay for extra public benefits and services may demonstrate a tension between the common good (more services) and economic motives (higher taxes for all). In…
Abstract
Purpose
Public willingness to pay for extra public benefits and services may demonstrate a tension between the common good (more services) and economic motives (higher taxes for all). In this article, the authors present an analysis of this trade-off by drawing upon the Bourdieusian theory of social reproduction and habitus.
Design/methodology/approach
Employing the European Social Survey (2016), the authors first examine the patterns of relationships between the agents' position in the social structure and their attitudes across care regimes in Europe. The authors then analyse whether this link is mediated by agents' individual trajectories and dispositions, such as their beliefs towards equality or tradition, political orientation, or religiosity.
Findings
The findings support the importance of both sociation and individuation in habitus formation, albeit to varying degrees across the regimes. Individual attitudes are therefore shaped not only by interests of reproducing or maximising social positions but also by more reflexive propensities to think about the common good.
Originality/value
In this article, the authors draw upon the theory of social reproduction and habitus by Pierre Bourdieu, who has been thus far rarely employed in the study of welfare attitudes. The article also contributes to the literature that studies the trade-off between the expansion and financing of reconciliation policies.