Date: November 20, 2008 (Tur.) 16：00～18：00
Venue: AA447, Research Building No.2, Yoshida Campus, Kyoto University
Presetation：
・Yasushi Kosugi (Professor, Graduate School of Asian and African Area Studies)
・Shinsuke Nagaoka (Ph.D.candidate, Graduate School of Asian and African Area Studies)
Under Initiative 1, activities are being conducted on three sub-groups on individual research themes in addition to the overall group activities. This seminar featured reports on research conducted by the Middle East and Islam subgroup, with the discussion focusing on Islamic economics. The first presentation, by Professor Yasushi Kosugi, included a brief presentation of the research activities conducted by the subgroup, followed by explanations of the historical development of Islamic economics and the basic structure of Islamic law that creates these unique characteristics. He analyzed historical changes in the interpretation of Islamic law concerning economic activities and discussed how Islamic economics has been positioned within arguments for the integration of religion and economics and the structure of the Islamic revival. The second presenter, Shinsuke Nagaoka, addressed Sharia-compliant assets, which has demonstrated vigorous growth in recent years within economic activities in the Islamic world. He concretely described the financial system used in Sharia-compliant assets, and while clearly explaining how interpretations of riba (interest) have been made by actors during the evolutionary process of financial commodities, discussed the historical significance of Sharia-compliant assets.
Sharia-compliant asset, which is one example of the Islamic revival movement, can be grasped as an example of a sustainable humanosphere formed by a fusion of the Holy Quran, the basis for living in the Islamic world, and the existing capitalist financial system. In the future, there is a need to explore the relation between such Islamic systems and the natural environment of the Islamic world, as typified by the oasis, and to carry out further discussions on how to formulate new paradigms in all spheres, including the geosphere, biosphere, and humanosphere, that give consideration to sustainability.
Another issue that emerged during the discussion was why riba is forbidden in the Islamic world, and what significance this has for contemporary capitalism. The pursuit of profits is the fundamental principle of contemporary capitalism, and it is commonly understood that profits can be divided into interest and the manager’s compensation. In order to explore the potential of Islamic principles to go beyond contemporary capitalism, these issues need to be clarified.
(Takahiro Sato and Koichi Fujita)