Between consumer demand and Islamic law: The evolution of Islamic credit cards in Turkey

dc.contributor.author

Çokgezen, M

dc.contributor.author

Kuran, T

dc.date.accessioned

2016-12-06T00:17:00Z

dc.date.issued

2015-11-01

dc.description.abstract

© 2015 Association for Comparative Economic Studies.The elimination of interest from financial transactions has been a salient goal of Islamization movements around the world. Its proponents have had to balance this objective, which they claim to draw from Islamic law (Sharia), against consumer demand for convenient products. In general they have opted to accommodate consumer demand, but surreptitiously, using legal ruses to disguise their compromises. Turkey's experience with credit cards offers a revealing case of the obfuscation in question. Having denounced credit cards as un-Islamic, Turkey's Islamic banks have all proceeded to issue credit cards of their own in order to remain competitive with their openly interest-friendly, conventional rivals. With local variations, the Turkish pattern resembles that of other markets where Islamic credit cards have made inroads. In Malaysia and the United Arab Emirates, too, Islamic credit cards function like those of the conventional banks with which they compete for customers. The "Islamic" features of Islamic credit cards amount to branding. Contrary to the claims of their proponents, they do not involve fundamental financial innovations.

dc.identifier.eissn

1095-7227

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0147-5967

dc.identifier.uri

https://hdl.handle.net/10161/13170

dc.publisher

Elsevier BV

dc.relation.ispartof

Journal of Comparative Economics

dc.relation.isversionof

10.1016/j.jce.2015.07.005

dc.title

Between consumer demand and Islamic law: The evolution of Islamic credit cards in Turkey

dc.type

Journal article

pubs.begin-page

862

pubs.end-page

882

pubs.issue

4

pubs.organisational-group

Duke

pubs.organisational-group

Economics

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Political Science

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Trinity College of Arts & Sciences

pubs.publication-status

Published

pubs.volume

43

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