Abstract

FERNANDES, José Pedro Teixeira. The Islamic finance in the Western societies. Relações Internacionais [online]. 2010, n.26, pp.95-111. ISSN 1645-9199.

In the last years several Western corporations from the financial sector, including banks, insurance companies, and rating agencies, begun to offer on the market financial products in conformity with the prescriptions of Islamic Shari’a. At the beginning, the targets were only the Arab and the Islamic markets mainly in the Middle East. More recently, this trend also extended to the Western market, targeting both the liquidity of Arab investors and the Muslim populations of Europe and North America with «ethical» products. Thus, the main objective of this paper is discussing, in a broad way, what is at stake with the expansion of the Islamic finance to the Western societies. The analysis will connect this business trend with other general developments, particularly with Islamism (political Islam), and the Western relativism and multiculturalism. The final purpose is to make an assessment of the possible consequences for the democratic and secular societies of the West.

Keywords : Islamism; finance; Europe; North America.

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