Malik, Maszlee
(2018)
Book Review: Foundation of Islamic Governance: A Southeast Asian Perspective.
International Journal of Asia Pacific Studies (IJAPS), 14 (1).
pp. 251-254.
ISSN ISSN: 1823-6243
Abstract
At frst, this reviewer was reluctant to pick up this book. He was not very
interested in Islamic political economy and he was not sure what he could
gain by reading this book. He turned out to be completely wrong. Maszlee
Malik has written a superb book that provides an intellectual framework for
anyone interested in deconstructing Western paradigms in the social sciences,
economics and management. He proposes an Islamic alternative that goes
beyond Islamic political economy but touches at the core of how the Muslim
world might look like in the future. This reviewer proposes to frst outline the
various chapters before making some further observations.
The book is composed of an introduction and eight chapters. These are:
Introduction; Chapter 1 (Governance: Defnitions and conceptual framework);
Chapter 2 (Deconstructing the concept of good governance); Chapter 3
(Religion and governance: A philosophical enquiry); Chapter 4 (Ontological
and epistemological sources for Islamic governance); Chapter 5 (New
approach to the texts: Epistemological methods-related concerns); Chapter
6 (Contribution of Muslim scholars in the development of knowledge base
for governance); Chapter 7 (Architectonics of Islamic governance: Locating
the axioms, foundational principles and working mechanisms); and Chapter 8
(Articulation of Islamic governance).
The titles of the chapters indicate the only problem with the book. Its
academic style can be off-putting for readers. However, once this reviewer got
used to this somewhat formal style of writing, reading this book became very
instructive.
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