Early Islam and the Birth of Capitalism proposes a strikingly original thesis—that capitalism first emerged in Arabia, not in late medieval Italian city states as is commonly assumed. Early Islam made a seminal but largely unrecognized contribution to the history of economic thought; it is the only religion founded by an entrepreneur. Descending from an elite dynasty of religious, civil, and commercial leaders, Muhammad was a successful businessman before founding Islam. As such, the new religion had much to say on trade, consumer protection, business ethics, and property. As Islam rapidly spread across the region so did the economic teachings of early Islam, which eventually made their way to Europe. Early Islam and the Birth of Capitalism demonstrates how Islamic institutions and business practices were adopted and adapted in Venice and Genoa. These financial innovations include the invention of the corporation, business management techniques, commercial arithmetic, and monetary reform. There were other Islamic institutions assimilated in Europe: charities, the waqf, inspired trusts, and institutions of higher learning; the madrasas were models for the oldest colleges of Oxford and Cambridge. As such, it can be rightfully said that these essential aspects of capitalist thought all have Islamic roots.

This paperback edition has an updated first chapter, resituating its main argument for today’s readers. New historical data on eigh­teenth- and nineteenth-century Egypt makes an extremely persuasive argument for the eighteenth-century roots of Egyptian modernity. The similarity, too, of Egyptian history with other Mediterranean countries is much more clearly demonstrated today than when Islamic Roots of Capitalism first was published.

The Fall of Capitalism and the Rise of Islam provides a critical analysis of the current financial crisis in the US and the world at large. It concludes that the current crisis could very well be a sign of failure of the underlying system of capitalism. The book shows that the system of capitalism contains serious faults and defects at the core theory level. Economic and financial crisis periodically occur whenever these defects are triggered by various conditions and political decisions during the life of capitalism. The collapse of financial institutions, the crash of the housing market, the evaporation of trillions of dollars, the creation of virtual unreal wealth, and the decline of productivity are symptoms of the potential failure of the ideology of capitalism. This failure has serious impact on the life quality of billions of people around the world who suffer from poverty, hunger, health insecurity, lack of education, and serious inhuman conditions. The world order under capitalism witnessed multiple world wars, political and economic instability, colonialism, absence of peace, deprivation of justice and polarization of wealth and power. This book predicts a potential crash and collapse of the world order under the pressure of a failing capitalism. Concurrent to the decline and potential collapse of capitalism, the book makes an account of another global phenomenon, namely the second rise of Islam. The rise of Islam, similar to the first one that lasted for thirteen hundred years, is a comprehensive rise that brings up the economic system together with the political system, and the moral system together with the legal system. It is much needed and sought to introduce to the world a system full of justice, fairness, and geared toward productivity and human righteousness. The new rise of Islam is argued to be in the best interest of the human societies around the world, and that the propagated fear of this rise is unfounded. The book provides a detailed description of the economic system and the political economy of Islam. It provides compelling evidence that the Islamic political economy characterized by sustained productivity and wealth distribution guarantees the satisfaction of the basic needs of a human. The Islamic political economy integrates several mechanisms for natural distribution of wealth, while it maintains a high level of productivity through the inhibition of usury, hoarding, and exploitation. The Fall of Capitalism and the Rise of Islam makes extensive references to a score of historians, scholars, and scientists who provide a fair testimony of the Islamic civilization and the ideology of Islam.

Max Weber and Islam is a major effort by Islamic-studies specialists to reexamine and appraise Max Weber's perspectives on Islam and its historical development. Eight specialists on Islam and two sociologists explore many dimensions of Weber's comments on Islam, along with Weber's conceptual framework. The volume's introduction links the discussions to contemporary issues and debates. Wolfgang Schluchter reconstructs Weber's conceptual apparatus as it applies to Islam and its historical development. In subsequent chapters, Islamic specialists consider such major topics as the developmental history of Islam, Islamic fundamentalism, Islamic reform, Islamic law and capitalism, secularization in Islam, as well as the value of attempting to apply Weber's concept of sects to Islam. While some authors find flaws in Weber's factual knowledge of Islam, they also find considerable merit in the kinds of questions Weber raised. Contributors to the volume include highly respected contemporary international scholars of Islam: Ira Lapidus, Nehemia Levtzion, Richard M. Eaton, Peter Hardy, Rudolph Peters, Barbara Metcalf, Francis Robinson, Patricia Crone, Michael Cook, and S.N. Eisenstadt. Toby Huff's introduction not only knits the thematics of the separate essays together but adds its own stresses while engaging the contributors in dialogue and debate about fundamental issues. This acute collective analysis establishes a new benchmark for understanding Weber and Islam. This book also provides an up-to-date overview of the developmental history of many aspects of Islam. A major reappraisal of the entire span of Max Weber's sociological thought on Islam, this book will appeal to a wide range of scholars and laymen interested in the Islamic world. It will be of particular interest to sociologists specializing in religion and Middle East area specialists.

Leading authority on the Islamic world and influential advisor to the Obama administration Vali Nasr shows that the West's best hope of winning the battle against Islamic extremists is to foster the growth of a vibrant new Muslim middle class. This flourishing of Muslim bourgeoisie is reshaping the mind-set, politics, and even the religious values of Muslims in much the same way the Western bourgeoisie lead the capitalist and democratic revolution in Europe. Whereas extremism has grown out of the dismal economic failures of the authoritarian Islamic regimes, Nasr explains, the wealth and aspirations of this Islamic "critical middle" put them squarely at odds with extremism. They have ushered in remarkable transformations already in Dubai, Turkey, and Indonesia, and they are the key to tipping the balance in both Iran and Pakistan. As he writes "the great battle for the soul of the Muslim world will be fought not over religion but over market capitalism."

Analyzes Muslim countries' contemporary problems, particularly violence, authoritarianism, and underdevelopment, comparing their historical levels of development with Western Europe.

In Markets of Civilization Muriam Haleh Davis provides a history of racial capitalism, showing how Islam became a racial category that shaped economic development in colonial and postcolonial Algeria. French officials in Paris and Algiers introduced what Davis terms “a racial regime of religion” that subjected Algerian Muslims to discriminatory political and economic structures. These experts believed that introducing a market economy would modernize society and discourage anticolonial nationalism. Planners, politicians, and economists implemented reforms that both sought to transform Algerians into modern economic subjects and drew on racial assumptions despite the formally color-blind policies of the French state. Following independence, convictions about the inherent link between religious beliefs and economic behavior continued to influence development policies. Algerian president Ahmed Ben Bella embraced a specifically Algerian socialism founded on Islamic principles, while French technocrats saw Algeria as a testing ground for development projects elsewhere in the Global South. Highlighting the entanglements of race and religion, Davis demonstrates that economic orthodoxies helped fashion understandings of national identity on both sides of the Mediterranean during decolonization.