The Political Economy of Islamic Banking and Finance in the Muslim World: A Case Study of Pakistan

Abstract

This dissertation explores three important aspects of Islamic banking and finance (hereafter IBF). First, attitude of key stakeholders: depositors/customers, general masses, religious scholars, Islamic political parties, employees of Islamic banks, officers State Bank of Pakistan and officers Ministry of Finance towards IBF. Secondly, factors responsible for converting IBF into a mass movement by boosting its adoption. Thirdly, some stakeholders are opposing the promulgation of IBF in Pakistan. Chapter 1 highlights the introduction and identifies gap in the area of research for Pakistan. Chapter 2 discusses the historical evolution of IBF in the Muslim World. Islamic concept of wealth accumulation is developed from divine sources of Quran and Sunnah. Chapter 3 focuses on the literature review in a thematic way. Chapter 4 traces out the linkages between IBF: A new paradigm in I.R. The IBF has a lot of scope due to the vast geography it covers and the huge population that is more than 1.6 billion Muslims in OIC. This chapter concludes that IBF is a mean to win friends by cooperation among the Muslim countries and other nations by interfaith dialogue. Chapter 5 discusses the data and methodology. We use online questionnaire to collect primary data of 1008 respondents. Further, our questionnaire is pre-tested before it is uploaded through establishing a website. We use descriptive analysis to explore the most important factors influencing political, economic, religious and social dimensions of IBF. Moreover, we use ordered logistic regressions to estimate the probability of adoption and non- adoption of IBF in Pakistan. In Chapter 6, we perform the descriptive analysis of each stakeholder group. We construct frequency tables, bar charts and histograms to explain our data. Our results show that despite the awareness of IBF, the said stakeholders are opposing the paradigm as it does not offer attractive, cheaper and need compatible products to customers and general masses. The Shari'a consistency of IBF is not supported by the majority of Ulema on the basis of its practices. Moreover, the religious forces of Pakistan are not aware of IBF opportunities such as political alliances, winning more assembly seats, job opportunities, dialogue with other nations, education and research. However, it is found that the religious consensus on IBF is possible by conducting conferences, establishing district boards and constituting dialogues among various sects of Ulema. The employees of Islamic banks, in general, lack in education and long run trainings, hence are unable to execute it properly. The IBF in Pakistan is suffering from the lack of political will and has been used by the successive regimes to achieve their political goals. Further, the bureaucracy opposes the implementation of IBF as they consider it a threat to their vested interests. Chapter 7 focuses on the logistic regression analysis. We conclude that majority of the Ulema demotivate their followers to adopt Islamic banking as they do not consider it truly Shari’a compliant. Similarly, no religious consensuses of ulema coupled with un-addressed social issues by IBF may decrease its adoption domestically and damage the cooperation among the Muslim world. Moreover, lack of political will coupled with opposition by the policy makers is a hurdle for the promulgation of IBF in Pakistan. Lastly, the unclear mechanism of IBF is the main hurdle faced by the employees of Islamic banking in its execution. Chapter 8 covers summary and conclusion along with policy implications.