Methodology for Theory Building in Islamic Economics: Some More Examples of Hypotheses

Abstract

The paper is a sequel of an earlier paper by the present writer on the same subject. The basic idea of the present paper as well the previous one was that the Muslim economists, if they are serious about developing Islamic economics as a social science, should move away from the process of restating the economic teachings of Islam. Instead, they should try to state human understanding of the divine texts as hypotheses in a language that permits validation of the hypotheses. That would be the first step toward building a theory of Islamic economics. The next step would be testing of the hypotheses and concluding on the validity of human understanding of the divine texts. In this slow and steady process a new discipline of Islamic economics, which could be called a social science, would develop. The previous paper presented examples of 15 hypotheses. The present paper presents examples of further 10 hypotheses. There is nothing sacrosanct about these examples. The objective is to encourage Muslim economists take steps for developing Islamic economics as a social science.