Famine, death from hunger and debt enslavement is the fact of life for the half of the people on earth not because that overall, the societies have scarce resources, but because the distribution of resources is inequitable as empirically proven by Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen and noted by Thomas Piketty in his recent book ‘Capital in the Twenty First Century’.
Studies in primary-data based religious choices or economic choices by religious persons can explain differences in social and economic choices between religious and non-religious groups, but measuring both the religiosity and its causal effect on behavior is difficult to establish. Furthermore, it is only a Godly endeavor to truly judge about religiosity.
Human welfare in Islamic worldview encompasses economic welfare, but comprises much more than that. The achievement of human welfare is sought in both aspects of human life, i.e. worldly life and eternal life hereafter.
Even though the principles like prohibition of Riba and Zakat are binding as rules, they also have an important economic rationale and function in economic matters of an Islamic society. Hence, the mandate of Islamic economics will be to explain their economic merit using experimental and observational data and by applying statistical and other suited techniques to establish certain analytical hypothesis.
As much as people can be selfish, they can be altruist as well. They have free will and they can be as much responsible as they can be reckless. What we need is a conditioning mechanism that nurtures positive tendencies.
From the risk and profitability perspective, Islamic modes of financing keep the Islamic financial system liquid and less prone to risk due to asset backing. Often, the investors with bank (the deposit holders) are risk averse and want consistent returns. But, small savers do not have enough funds to finance big volume projects directly. But, using investors’ pool of funds to provide financing, the investors are able to share in benefit of such economic activities.
In Islamic economic framework, increase in investment through entrepreneurial activities could increase the labor demand and wages. Increase in wages will improve the standard of living of poor labor class and enable them to improve their productivity further.
The recent literature on Islamic economics hardly makes use of mathematics even for expositional purposes. Mathematics is a language. It keeps argument and logic straight. Just like growth models could talk of seemingly non-mathematical concepts like public infrastructure, social infrastructure and governance, one can incorporate Islamic principles to show how they could be more welfare enhancing. For instance, the need is to show the impact and effects of Islamic principles on allocation of resources, income distribution, externalities and so on using mathematics.
Institution of family is highly respected in Islam. Women are indispensable part of this institution. As per Islamic worldview, mental and physical capabilities that we enjoy are the blessings of Allah and we hold them as a trust. Therefore, based on the differences in these mental and physical capabilities alone, no one is superior and powerful in the eyes of Allah.
Both the absence of broad based wealth taxes and the legal decree of allowing compound interest on money capital are the prime sources of wealth concentration. If both are corrected, capitalists would not be able to systematically exploit in competitive markets.
Reflections on the Origins in the Post COVID-19 World (Paperback)
ISBN: 978-96923470-0-6 An engaging book to reflect on the origins and the deeper questions of existence and meaning in life in the light of knowledge from science, philosophy and faith as we live through and beyond the COVID-19 world.
$8.00
