Hostname: page-component-77f85d65b8-6c7dr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-04-18T16:18:22.872Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

From Wall Street to Halal Street: Malaysia and the Globalization of Islamic Finance

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 October 2013

Daromir Rudnyckyj
Get access

Abstract

Malaysia's plans to become a transnational hub for Islamic finance represent an effort to mobilize religion to create new global networks for the circulation of capital. This article first contextualizes such efforts within the broader contours of Malaysia's political history, addressing the classification of ethnicity and religion by both the colonial and postcolonial states. The article describes how Islamic finance is defined by practitioners in Malaysia and explains the key features they invoke to distinguish it from what they call “conventional finance”. Finally, it identifies the steps undertaken by the state to make the country a global center of Islamic finance. As the recent financial crises have shaken confidence in North Atlantic financial systems, Malaysia is geographically and culturally well-positioned between two emergent economic regions currently at the forefront of global economic growth.

Information

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Asian Studies , Volume 72 , Issue 4 , November 2013 , pp. 831 - 848
Copyright
Copyright © The Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 2013 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

List of References

Abdul Ghafar, Ismail. 2010. Money, Islamic Banks and the Real Economy. Singapore: Cengage Learning.Google Scholar
Baxstrom, Richard. 2008. Houses in Motion: The Experience of Place and the Problem of Belief in Urban Malaysia. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Beeson, Mark. 2000. “Mahathir and the Markets: Globalisation and the Pursuit of Economic Autonomy in Malaysia.” Pacific Affairs 73(3):335–51.Google Scholar
Bunnell, Tim. 2004. Malaysia, Modernity and the Multimedia Super Corridor: A Critical Geography of Intelligent Landscapes. London: Routledge Curzon.Google Scholar
Chin, Christine. 1998. In Service and Servitude: Foreign Female Domestic Workers and the Malaysian “Modernity” Project. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Çizakça, Murat. 2011. Islamic Capitalism and Finance: Origins, Evolution and the Future. Cheltenham, U.K.: Edward Elgar.10.4337/9780857931481Google Scholar
Crouch, Harold. 1996. Government and Society in Malaysia. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press.10.7591/9781501733901Google Scholar
Department of Statistics Malaysia. 2010. “Population and Housing Census.” http://www.statistics.gov.my/portal/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1215%3Apopulation-distribution-and-basic-demographic-characteristic-report-population-and-housing-census-malaysia-2010-updated-2972011&catid=130%3Apopulation-distribution-and-basic-demographic-characteristic-report-population-and-housing-census-malaysia-2010&Itemid=154&lang=en (accessed August 31, 2013).Google Scholar
Dusuki, Asyraf Wajdi. 2010. “Can Bursa Malaysia's Suq Al-Sila' (Commodity Murabahah House) Resolve the Controversy over Tawarruq?” Kuala Lumpur: International Shari'ah Research Academy for Islamic Finance.Google Scholar
Esposito, John L. 1998. Islam and Politics. Syracuse, N.Y.: Syracuse University Press.Google Scholar
Evers, Hans-Dieter. 2003. “Transition Towards a Knowledge Society: Malaysia and Indonesia in Comparative Perspective.” Comparative Sociology 2(2):355–73.Google Scholar
Fischer, Johan. 2008. Proper Islamic Consumption: Shopping among the Malays in Modern Malaysia. Copenhagen: NIAS.Google Scholar
Furnivall, John S. 1948. Colonial Policy and Practice: A Comparative Study of Burma and Netherlands India. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Gulf Times. 2011. “Qatar Follows Malaysia to Boost Islamic Banking.” February 9. http://www.gulf-times.com/site/topics/article.asp?cu_no=2&item_no=414832&version=1&template_id=48&parent_id=28 (accessed May 21, 2012).Google Scholar
Hefner, Robert. 2010. “Religious Resurgence in Contemporary Asia: Southeast Asian Perspectives on Capitalism, the State, and the New Piety.” Journal of Asian Studies 69(4):1031–47.Google Scholar
Hirschman, Charles. 1987. “The Meaning and Measurement of Ethnicity in Malaysia: An Analysis of Census Classifications.” Journal of Asian Studies 46(3):555–82.Google Scholar
Iqbal, Munawar, and Molyneux, Philip. 2005. Thirty Years of Islamic Banking: History, Performance, and Prospects. Houndmills, U.K.: Palgrave Macmillan.Google Scholar
ISRA (International Shariah Research Academy). 2009. “Responsibility Banking.” ISRA Bulletin, April.Google Scholar
Sundaram, Jomo Kwame. 1990–91. “Whither Malaysia's New Economic Policy?” Pacific Affairs 63(4):469–99.Google Scholar
Sundaram, Jomo Kwame and Cheek, Ahmad Shabery. 1992. “Malaysia's Islamic Movements.” In Fragmented Vision: Culture and Politics in Contemporary Malaysia, eds. Kahn, Joel S. and Wah, Francis Loh Kok, 79–106. Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press.Google Scholar
Kessler, Clive S. 1978. Islam and Politics in a Malay State, Kelantan, 1838–1969. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Khiyar, Khiyar Abdalla. 2005. The Rise and Development of Interest-Free Banking. New Delhi: Institute of Objective Studies.Google Scholar
Laldin, Muhammad Akram. 2008. “The Islamic Financial System: The Malaysian Experience and the Way Forward.” Humanomics 24(3):217–38.Google Scholar
Lepinay, Vincent. 2011. Codes of Finance: Engineering Derivatives in a Global Bank. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Maurer, Bill. 2005. Mutual Life, Limited: Islamic Banking, Alternative Currencies, Lateral Reason. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Mauzy, Diane, and Milne, R. Stephen. 1983–84. “The Mahathir Administration in Malaysia: Discipline through Islam.” Pacific Affairs 56(4):617–48.10.2307/2758595Google Scholar
Milne, R. Stephen, and Mauzy, Diane. 1999. Malaysian Politics under Mahathir. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Muzaffar, Chandra. 1987. Islamic Resurgence in Malaysia. Petaling Jaya: Fajar Bakti.Google Scholar
Nagata, Judith A. 1984. The Reflowering of Malaysian Islam: Modern Religious Radicals and Their Roots. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press.Google Scholar
Noor, Farish A. 2010. “On the Permanent Hajj: The Tablighi Jama'at in South East Asia.” South East Asia Research 18(4):707–34.10.5367/sear.2010.0019Google Scholar
Ong, Aihwa. 1987. Spirits of Resistance and Capitalist Discipline: Factory Women in Malaysia. Albany: State University of New York Press.Google Scholar
Ong, Aihwa. 1990. “State Versus Islam: Malay Families, Women's Bodies, and the Body Politic in Malaysia.” American Ethnologist 17(2):258–76.10.1525/ae.1990.17.2.02a00040Google Scholar
Ong, Aihwa. 1999. Flexible Citizenship: The Cultural Logics of Transnationality. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press.Google Scholar
Ong, Aihwa. 2006. Neoliberalism as Exception: Mutations in Citizenship and Sovereignty. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press.Google Scholar
Osman, Mohamed. 2010. “The Transnational Network of Hizbut Tahrir Indonesia.” South East Asia Research 18(4):735–55.10.5367/sear.2010.0018Google Scholar
Peletz, Michael G. 2002. Islamic Modern: Religious Courts and Cultural Politics in Malaysia. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Pepinsky, Thomas. n.d. “Islamic Finance in Multicultural Indonesia.” https://courses.cit.cornell.edu/tp253/docs/islamic_banking.pdf (accessed May 21, 2012).Google Scholar
Pitluck, Aaron. 2008. “Moral Behavior in Stock Markets: Islamic Finance and Socially Responsible Investment.” In Economics and Morality: Anthropological Approaches, eds. Browne, Katherine and Milgram, Lynne, 233–55. Lanham, Md.: AltaMira Press.Google Scholar
Reid, Anthony. 1969. “The Kuala Lumpur Riots and the Malaysian Political System.” Australian Outlook 23(3):258–78.Google Scholar
Rosly, Saiful Azhar. 2005. Critical Issues on Islamic Banking and Financial Markets: Islamic Economics, Banking and Finance, Investments, Takaful and Financial Planning. Kuala Lumpur: Dinamas Publishing.Google Scholar
Sadiq, Jahabar. 2012. “Disquiet over BNM Request to Fund US$1b Mega Islamic Bank.” Malaysian Insider, June 23. http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/malaysia/article/disquiet-over-bnm-request-to-fund-us1b-mega-islamic-bank (accessed June 28, 2012).Google Scholar
Baharuddin, Shamsul Amri. 2001. “A History of an Identity, an Identity of a History: The Idea and Practice of ‘Malayness’ in Malaysia Reconsidered.” Journal of Southeast Asian Studies 32(3):355–66.Google Scholar
Sloane, Patricia. 1999. Islam, Modernity, and Entrepreneurship among the Malays. New York: St. Martin's Press.Google Scholar
Tett, Gillian. 2009. Fool's Gold: The Inside Story of J.P. Morgan and How Wall Street Greed Corrupted Its Bold Dream and Created a Financial Catastrophe. New York: Free Press.Google Scholar
Udovitch, Abraham L. 1970. Partnership and Profit in Medieval Islam. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press.10.1515/9781400820474Google Scholar
Venardos, Angelo M. 2006. Islamic Banking and Finance in South-East Asia: Its Development and Future. Hackensack, N.J.: World Scientific.10.1142/6179Google Scholar
Warde, Ibrahim. 2010. Islamic Finance in the Global Economy. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.Google Scholar