论文化与社会和谐

文化是社会和谐的灵魂,多元民族文化的共存共荣是构建新疆社会和谐的基础。研究并推进由伊斯兰文化和非伊斯兰文化构成的新疆多元民族文化的发展繁荣,可以促进新疆社会的持久稳定及和谐发展。     

Oil,Laws, and Female Labor Force Participation

Despite the rapid rise of women’s education and the fall of their fertility rates in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), female labor force participation (FLFP) rates remain low. This paper argues that oil and gas rents and Islamic family law jointly matter. Controlling for country and year fixed-effects in a long panel dataset, it shows that per capita oil and gas rents reduce FLFP rates in countries with Islamic family law more than others. The results are robust to econometric methodology and to controlling for the interaction of rents and all other time-constant factors that are common across the MENA region, such as culture, social norms, and institutions. Moreover, the results cannot be replicated by substituting historical plough use, a strong predictor of gender discrimination, in place of Islamic family law. Policy implications are discussed.     

Political Economy and Islamic Politics: Insights from the Indonesian Case

It is argued in this study that the trajectory of Islamic politics in Indonesia has been shaped within larger processes of state formation and socio-economic and political changes associated with the advance of the market economy and the pressures of globalisation. It incorporates the Indonesian case into a vast and well-developed debate that has hitherto focused on North Africa and the Middle East. As such it offers a distinct interpretation that goes beyond the prevailing understanding of Islamic politics in Indonesia as the product of conflicts over ideas, doctrine or culture or the institutional requisites of authoritarianism or democracy. Specifically, it is proposed that Islamic politics has been underpinned variously by the conservatism of small propertied interests, the populism of marginalised urban and small town middle classes and the ambitions of the upper middle classes and business. While these dynamics are found across much of the Muslim world, the political outcomes have been diverse. We show that the Indonesian trajectory has been greatly influenced by the failure of Islamic politics to establish effective cross-class alliances behind the banners of Islam and the ability of the secular state to effectively establish its own apparatus of populist politics.     

Islamic Economics in the Late Ottoman Empire: Menâpirzâde Nuri Bey's Mebâhis-i İlm-i Servet

The existing literature on Islamic economics suggests that Islamic economics is a twentieth-century phenomenon with its roots in medieval Islamic intellectual and theological history, thereby leaving a centuries-long gap in the history of Islamic economic thinking. This study aims at taking a first step towards filling this gap by examining a nineteenth-century example of Islamic economics in late Ottoman economic literature. Suggesting a broader definition of Islamic economics, this article investigates a prominent Ottoman intellectual's efforts to define, reveal, and revive a tradition of Islamic economics in historical and intellectual context.     

Islamic financial markets and global crises: Contagion or decoupling?

This paper investigates the contagion effects of the global financial crisis (GFC) and Eurozone sovereign debt crisis (ESDC) on Islamic equity and bond markets. Using a sample of Islamic stock indices from various developed and emerging markets and the global Islamic stock and bond (sukuk) indices, we explore asymmetric conditional correlation dynamics across stable and crisis periods and across the two crises. The results fail to provide strong contagion evidence between conventional and Islamic equity and bond indices, supporting the decoupling hypothesis of the Islamic securities. Our findings imply that Islamic equities and bonds may provide a cushion against risk and instability, particularly in periods of turmoil. The small number of contagion cases mostly relates to the ESDC and developed Islamic stock indices. The findings also show that the Islamic emerging stock indices in the BRICS provide the most effective international portfolio diversification benefits compared to the Islamic developed indices.     

Corporate Islam,Global Capitalism and the Performance of Economic Moralities

Recent years have witnessed the rapid expansion of the Islamic economy, which by some estimates has reached a size of US$4 trillion. The growth of the Islamic economy presents an intriguing test case for the compatibility of global capitalism and moral – in this case specifically Islamic – principles. This article adopts a performative lens to draw attention to the role of the World Islamic Economic Forum and the Global Islamic Economy Summit as legitimation mechanisms celebrating economic diversity and the success of Muslim- entrepreneurs with the aim of increasing the visibility of the Islamic economy. Here, a polyphony of Muslim voices is sought to be consolidated into the voice of ‘business Islam’, with important implications for how the Islamic economy is conceived, defined and delineated.     

Public attention to “Islamic terrorism” and stock market returns

Does public attention to Islamic terrorism affect the performance of Islamic and conventional indices? We answer this question by empirically examining the effects of US public attention to Islamic terrorism on returns of US Islamic and conventional indices between 2004 and 2017. US public attention to Islamic terrorism is measured using Google Search Volume, which reflects active public attentiveness, and media coverage, which measures passive attentiveness. We test its effect on the stock returns of Islamic and conventional indices by using difference-in-difference analysis. The results indicate that US public attention to Islamic terrorism negatively affects US Islamic indices, suggesting that investors may make amalgams between terrorism and Islamic finance. These clichés may lead them to sell Sharia-compliant assets when US public attention to Islamic terrorism is high. Taken together, our findings provide new evidence and financial implications for investors and providers of Islamic financial products.     

Are Islamic finance innovations enough for investors to escape from a financial downturn? Further evidence from portfolio simulations

Does Islamic finance constitute a promising solution for the current global financial crisis and are Islamic financial innovations enough to reassure investors, stabilize financial systems and provide them with a means of escaping from financial downturns? This article addresses these questions while investigating the dynamics of Islamic and conventional stock prices over the last few years. In particular, we apply Multivariate Vector Autoregressive (VAR) tools to test the interaction between conventional and Islamic financial products, and implement the Granger causality test to specify the dependence orientation of feedback between Islamic and conventional stock prices. Our article differs from previous work on the topic in that it develops portfolio simulations to determine whether Islamic finance can supplant conventional finance by generating investment and diversification opportunities during periods of crisis. In addition, we develop optimal portfolio strategies and investment proportions for conventional and Islamic funds to ensure the best resource allocation. Our main findings are: (i) the impact of the current crisis on the Islamic finance industry is less marked than on conventional finance, (ii) investment in Islamic products generates high returns, (iii) portfolios that include Islamic products reduce systemic risk and generate significant diversification benefits, (iv) the US crisis has led to significant changes in resource allocation through changes in investment choices.     

Comparative risk adjusted performance of Islamic,socially responsible and conventional funds: Evidence from United Kingdom

This study investigates the risk and return characteristics of Islamic funds in comparison with SRI and the conventional open-end mutual funds for the UK, which, having attracted over £11.7 billion in Islamic investment in the past decade has emerged as the largest financial market for Islamic funds in the west. In addition, contrasting with previous literature, this research categorizes SRI and Islamic funds into two distinct types in order to allow a fair comparison. Our findings demonstrate that Islamic and SRI funds in general perform close to the conventional funds with significantly better risk-return tradeoff in US focused funds. Results further indicate that the UK-based Islamic and SRI funds were less effected during financial crisis as the magnitude of loss was significantly lower for them when compared to conventional funds. The research suggests that Islamic and SRI funds do provide a rational substitute and investors can benefit from investing in these funds as ethic and faith-based screening criteria do not affect the returns of Islamic and SRI funds adversely. This was also substantiated by our findings on investment behavior of these funds.     

Religiosity versus rationality: Depositor behavior in Islamic and conventional banks

This study investigates the behavioral aspects of Islamic bank depositors in a dual banking system. By categorizing depositors into groups based on the amount of their deposited funds, we estimate the responses of these groups to interest rate changes. We take the findings of conventional banks as a comparative baseline and investigate the extent to which the changes in different Islamic depositor groups differ from conventional depositor groups. The findings show that depositors in both Islamic and conventional banks respond to interest rate changes. The analysis indicates that Islamic bank depositors are more responsive when their deposit sizes are larger. When Islamic bank depositors’ opportunity costs rise due to a rise in the interest rate, they do not hesitate to withdraw deposits. The relation between interest rate changes and deposits is more robust in Islamic banks than in conventional banks.     

Modelling the effect of the geographical environment on Islamic banking performance: A panel quantile regression analysis

While studies have focused on Islamic banking, research on the effect of the geographical environment on Islamic banks is scarce. We investigate this issue by using daily data on 12 Islamic banks in four regions (Africa, Asia, Europe, and the United States) from July 2007 to April 2016. We apply different methodological approaches (principal component analysis, panel data tests, and quantile regression). First, the principal component analysis shows that the performance of Islamic banks varies among regions. Second, the linear panel regression highlights that the geographical environment positively and significantly affects Islamic banking, suggesting the importance of externality effects. Finally, the environmental effect seems to vary with quantiles (positive effect for the lowest quantile versus negative effect for the highest quantile). This quantile specification points to nonlinearity in the environment–Islamic bank performance relationship, reflecting a time-varying discipline imposed by the Sharia board (Islamic Law). This finding helps better explain the main difference between Islamic banks in the East (Africa and Asia) and those in the West (Europe and the United States) and also enables investors to adjust their portfolio choices when considering the products of Islamic banks according to regional specificities.     

How Islamic are Islamic banks? A non-linear assessment of Islamic rate – conventional rate relations

In this paper, we perform a non-linear assessment of Islamic rate – conventional rate relations for the case of Malaysia. Using monthly data covering the period January 1999 to November 2016, we find strong evidence supporting non-linear reactions of the Islamic investment rates to conventional rates in the long run and/or short-run for all matched maturities. More precisely, the Islamic investment rates exhibit faster upward movement (slower downward movement) in responses to conventional deposit rate increases (decreases). The asymmetric pricing behaviour of Islamic banks however tends to weaken as maturity lengthens. Accordingly, we infer that Islamic banks do not rigidly peg their investment deposit rates to conventional deposit rates as some have claimed in questioning the Islamicity of Islamic banks.     

Are Islamic Banks More Resilient During Financial Panics?

Islamic banking is one of the fastest growing segments of the financial sector in developing countries. Rapid growth of this segment is accompanied with claims about its relative resilience to financial crises as compared to conventional banking. However, little empirical evidence is available to support such claims. Using data from Pakistan, where Islamic and conventional banks co‐exist, we compare the behaviour of Islamic and conventional banks during a financial panic. Our results show that Islamic bank branches are less prone to deposit withdrawals during financial panics, both unconditionally and after controlling for bank characteristics. The Islamic branches of banks that have both Islamic and conventional operations tend to attract (rather than lose) deposits during panics, which suggests a role for religious branding. We also find that Islamic bank branches grant more loans during financial panics and that their lending decisions are less sensitive to changes in deposits. Our findings suggest that greater financial inclusion of faith‐based groups may enhance the stability of the banking system.     

Further evidence on international Islamic and conventional portfolios diversification under regime switching

This article investigates the comparative performance of International Islamic and conventional portfolio diversification across different financial market regimes and provides an optimal choice from an American investor’s viewpoint during the period 2002–2014. Using a bootstrap-based stochastic dominance (SD) test and monthly MSCI prices of Islamic stock market indices and their conventional counterparts in 38 countries from North and Latin America, Europe and Asia-Pacific regions, we find that SD relationships between Islamic and conventional optimal-diversified portfolios change systematically according to investment region and market regime. Essentially, for all regimes, US investors are indifferent between Islamic diversification and its conventional counterpart, which implies that arbitrage diversification opportunities are rare and short lived in all regions. However, across all regions, especially in a crisis regime, Islamic portfolio diversification can be a good substitute for conventional diversification. Islamic portfolio diversification in North and Latin America, Europe and Global regions is an optimal choice for the risk-averse American investors. Finally, results imply that portfolio diversification among Islamic market indices can be a good hedge, offering investors superior investment alternatives during any financial meltdown or economic slowdown due to the conservative nature of Sharia-compliant investments.     

Islamic Banking in Malaysia: Unchartered Waters

This paper explores the Islamic banking business in Malaysia since its beginning in 1983. The Islamic banking sector has achieved its target of 20% market share in assets and deposits in 2010. To boost the industry's competitiveness and efficiency, the demands of the market forces will have to be delicately balanced with the dictates of the Shari'ah. The search for niche Islamic banking products warrants enhancements in the current regulatory, legal, and fiscal infrastructure for Islamic banking, without which these products cannot be a viable alternative to the conventional ones. While the prevailing infrastructure is conducive to Islamic banking products that hold similar characteristics with interest‐bearing loans, Shari'ah compliance can be a futile exercise when the purpose of the law (maqasid al‐shari'ah) is overlooked, for there is much more to Islamic banking than the elimination of interest.     

On the post-financial crisis performance of Islamic mutual funds: the case of Riyad funds

Using Riyad Capital mutual funds as a proxy for Saudi Arabian mutual funds, this paper empirically compares the risk-adjusted performance and investment style of Islamic mutual funds with that of conventional funds in the wake of the recent global financial crisis of 2009–2014. Absolute and relative risk-adjusted measures with single factor (Jensen) and multifactor (Carhart) models are applied. Our findings suggest that Islamic funds outperformed conventional funds domestically, given similar risk exposure, and produced comparable results under lower market risk globally. The results show that Islamic funds are a relatively big cap from the strong statistical significance registered on the global side as evidenced by the difference portfolio outcomes. In addition, the difference portfolios provide statistical evidence that Islamic funds are more value-oriented compared to conventional funds on both fronts. Furthermore, Islamic funds tend to slightly favour a contrarian trading investment strategy as suggested by statistically significant local portfolio value and global difference portfolios results. The results of home bias test show stronger ties by local Islamic funds to local market relative to the global proxy suggesting that domestic investors and managers favour Islamic funds over conventional funds, thus confirming a local preference for Shari’ah-compliant investments.     

Bank overall financial strength: Islamic versus conventional banks

A number of recent studies compare the performance of Islamic and conventional banks with the use of individual financial ratios or efficiency frontier techniques. The present study extends this strand of the literature, by comparing Islamic banks, conventional banks, and banks with an Islamic window with the use of a bank overall financial strength index. This index is developed with a multicriteria methodology that allows us to aggregate various criteria capturing bank capital strength, asset quality, earnings, liquidity, and management quality in controlling expenses. We find that banks differ significantly in terms of individual financial ratios; however, the difference of the overall financial strength between Islamic and conventional banks is not statistically significant. This finding is confirmed with both univariate comparisons and in multivariate regression estimations. When we look at the bank financial strength within regions, we find that conventional banks outperform both the Islamic banks and the banks with Islamic window in the case of Asia and the Gulf Cooperation Council; however, Islamic banks perform better in the MENA and Senegal region. Second stage regressions also reveal that the bank overall financial strength index is influenced by various country-specific attributes. These include control of corruption, government effectiveness, and operation in one of the seven countries that are expected to drive the next big wave in Islamic finance.     

Business cycle and bank lending procyclicality in a dual banking system

The paper studies bank lending behaviour over the business cycle in a dual banking system, Malaysia, with the objective of ascertaining whether Islamic banks have a role in stabilizing credit. The study makes use of unbalanced panel data of 21 conventional banks and 16 Islamic banks covering mostly the period 2001–2013. Applying dynamic GMM estimators, we find the aggregate loans by banks to be pro-cyclical in conformity with existing studies. However, when we segregate the lending/financing behaviour of conventional and Islamic banks, the cyclicality of bank lending seems to be true only for conventional banks. As for the Islamic banks, the business cycle does not seem to affect their financing decisions. Indeed, there is indication that the Islamic banks in general and the full-fledged Islamic banks in particular can even be counter-cyclical in their financing decisions. This conclusion is fairly robust to a different loan measure, alternative model specifications, and to an alternative business cycle measure. Hence, our results provide further support to the “stability” view of the Islamic banks in that they have the ability to stabilize credit.     

A paper economy of faith without faith in paper: A reflection on Islamic institutional history

This article contributes to the literature on Islamic institutional history by examining how the discounting of documents in Islamic legal practice constrained the organization of early modern Muslim trade. It is argued that the reliance on literacy, on the one hand, and an Islamic legal framework, on the other, gave early modern Muslim traders a comparative advantage in economic organization, but the lack of faith in paper as documentary evidence in Islamic law posed fundamental constraints to the development of Muslim economies.