The Typewritten Market: Shari'ah-Compliance and Securitisation in the Law of Islamic Finance

Cattelan, Valentino (2020) The Typewritten Market: Shari'ah-Compliance and Securitisation in the Law of Islamic Finance. Arab Law Quarterly, 35 (12). pp. 74-91. ISSN 0268-0556

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Abstract

Taking inspiration from Szymborska’s poem ‘The people on the bridge’ (1986) and Messick’s Calligraphic State (1993), this article interprets the law of Islamic finance as evidence of a radical shift in the social anthropology of Islamic law from classical to contemporary times. To this aim it highlights the changes from fiqh in medieval trade (where individual actions were judged by rules legitimised by their local context) to the current process of Shari‘ah-compliance, arguing that this process belongs to a textual polity where standardised certificates, contracts and securities have replaced actual social relations in the global financial market. In the light of this, the article advances the notion of Typewritten Market to depict the nature of Islamic finance as a socio-economic space embodying a ‘de-materialised Šarī‘ah’: that is to say, a meaning of Islamic law whose contemporary time belongs more to legal/financial technology rather than to Muslim human action.

Item Type: Article
Identification Number: https://doi.org/10.1163/15730255-BJA10051
Dates:
DateEvent
11 May 2020Accepted
13 July 2020Published Online
Uncontrolled Keywords: Islamic finance – Shari‘ah-compliance – Islamic law – anthropology
Subjects: CAH16 - law > CAH16-01 - law > CAH16-01-01 - law
Divisions: Faculty of Business, Law and Social Sciences > School of Law
Depositing User: Valentino Cattelan
Date Deposited: 21 Jul 2021 11:26
Last Modified: 12 Jan 2022 14:08
URI: https://www.open-access.bcu.ac.uk/id/eprint/11968

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