Moral Economy Approach Research Articles

Testing the development impact of islamic banking: Islamic moral economy approach to development

Redistributive justice and stakeholder development have been central objectives of the Islamic moral economy for which Islamic banking was considered a facilitatory operational tool. Being its institutional form, the emergence of Islamic finance is, therefore, related to rescuing ‘human, land, labour and capital’ so that extended stake-holding governance can be achieved. As opposed to the institutional logic of conventional finance, within the Islamic moral economy paradigm, Islamic finance, theoretically, is expected to essentialise justice and equilibrium and equalise development opportunities for all stakeholders to fulfil their development path towards perfection. To assess the Islamic moral economy performance of Islamic banking, this paper uses HDI and GINI as the dependent variables to determine short-run and long-run relationships between Islamic banking growth and the development of the economy through socioeconomic indicators. The data covers the period 2000–2021 with fourteen countries with a systemic presence of Islamic finance, The results show that although Islamic banks did not cause an increase in inequality, as opposed to expectations, they neither caused a decrease in the sampled countries. As for the effect of Islamic banking expansion on human development, it positively contributes to human development only in the long run under certain conditions, which cannot be established in the short run. If sustained, this should be considered positive progress as opposed to the experience observed in the initial period of Islamic banking.

‘A man’s gift will make room for him’: sources of wealth and legitimacy in charismatic Christianity in Ghana

ABSTRACT The moral practices and principles of accumulating and (re)distributing wealth in charismatic Christianity in Africa are controversial and contested. In Ghana, rich charismatic pastors are perceived as dubious figures and the legitimacy of their wealth is questionable. At the same time, a pastor’s wealth is a sign of his or her spiritual and charismatic gifts. In this article, I discuss the ways in which Ghanaian charismatic pastors, church members and the broader public understand different forms and shifting principles of wealth acquisition and (re)distribution within the religious field. The article highlights the dynamic and fluid nature of distinctions such as legitimate and illegitimate and argues that a moral economy approach is apt for capturing these tensions. Moreover, it is important to include religion and sources of spiritual power in the analysis of moral economies as these are crucial parts of social life and moral values in many African societies.

The moral economy of the English football crowd: The European Super League and the contingency of football fan activism

On 18 April 2021, six of the most storied clubs in English football – Arsenal, Chelsea, Manchester City, Liverpool, Manchester United and Tottenham Hotspur – announced they would be joining a new breakaway European Super League. These proposals triggered vehement opposition from football fans, which catalysed the intervention of the UK government in the form of a fan-led review of football governance. The reaction to the European Super League – which collapsed within 48 hours – demonstrates that the commodification and globalisation of football is contested. This article applies the lens of moral economy to analyse the contemporary mobilisations of football fans in England counter to these processes. The novel application of a moral economy framework provides a fresh perspective within the extant literature on football fan activism. This article represents the first systematic application of a moral economy approach to the political sociology of contemporary sport and its fandom. Employing an expanded understanding of moral economy, the article extends its application beyond the analysis of pre-modern food riots popularised by E.P. Thompson, incorporating the insights of Karl Polanyi and Andrew Sayer. Adopting this broader meaning, the concept of moral economy enables us to explore emergent and dynamic forms of fan activism, which seek to contest the commodification of football. The supporter mobilisations against the European Super League are examined to illuminate this perspective. Through an exploration of the contingency of the moral economy of football fandom, this article expands, in conceptual terms, the literature on football-based social movements, connecting it to the wider commodification and financialisation of football (as an important aspect of everyday life) and the internal contradictions and crisis of advanced capitalism.

Familisme dalam Manajemen Rumah Makan Sederhana di Kota Makassar

The Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises sector, including simple restaurant business activities in Makassar City, contributes to the economy. This study aims to reveal the management of family-based restaurants and their implications for creating wealth, especially within the family environment. The method used in answering the research objectives, then carried out observations, interviews, and document studies. The results of the study show that restaurant owners prefer to recruit employees from family and relatives based on the moral economy approach. The selection of employees with a moral economy approach for restaurant owners is intended so that these employees can obtain a more prosperous level of economic life and a more proper education.

The Normative Construction of and Contestation over In-Work Benefits in Hong Kong: A Moral Economy Approach

Informed by moral economy theories, this article presents a qualitative study of the normative construction of and contestation over a new in-work benefit in Hong Kong, the Low-income Working Family Allowance (LIFA). Using a policy stakeholder approach to examining the public’s ideas and justifications of LIFA, the findings reveal the eligibility-defined entitlement shared by claimants, scepticism towards long working hours conditionality required by LIFA, complex understanding of deservingness and self-reliance, and dissatisfaction with the closing gap between welfare and wages. This article connects moral economy theories to the normative basis of a social security system, offering insights for capturing the dynamics of consensus and controversies about social welfare. It also extends the research on morality and social welfare from Western countries to an Asian context. The case of Hong Kong evidences how policy stakeholders make moral sense of a new welfare in the absence of social right language.

REGIONAL INTEGRATION IN AFRICA UNDER THE SHADOW OF THE MORAL ECONOMY OF THE EU-AFRICA RELATIONSHIP

Since the first moves of decolonization, African countries have not overcome the negative effects of colonization and are still facing underdevelopment, poverty gap, and low share in world trade The interregional relationship established with the European countries after independence does not seem to fulfill the development promises the European Economic Community made at the beginning. With many regional economic communities and conflicting trade rules, regional integration in Africa is so complex that it is described as a spaghetti bowl, in line with Bhagwati's definition. In addition, all the delays and discussions surrounding the Economic Partnership Agreements and the uncertainties regarding the future of the relations experienced before the signing of the post-Cotonou Agreement in April 2021, have also strained the interregional relationship with the EU. The article aims to discuss Africa's development and regional integration problems by blending the Moral Economy approach and the Historical Discourse Analysis method. This article discusses the current development and regional integration problems in Africa from a moral economy approach, combining it with Discourse Historical Analysis. It considers regional integration as one of the norms that the moral economy of the EU-Africa interregional relationship has been based on and explores its construction within this moral economy from a historical perspective. The main concern of this article is to investigate the construction of the regional integration norm in parallel to the development co-operation discourse and to explain its role in obscuring the impact of EU development co-operation on the current development and regional integration process in Africa, as well as the problems in the EU-Africa interregional relationship itself.

The Moral Economy of Solidarity: A Longitudinal Study of Special Needs Teachers

Based on a longitudinal study of a Pupil Referral Unit (PRU) in England for children excluded from mainstream schools and utilising a moral economy lens, this article explores how solidarity is created and maintained in a very particular community of teachers and learning support assistants (LSAs). A moral economy approach highlights the centrality of people’s moral norms and values for understanding the multi-layered dimensions of solidarity in organisations and how it changes in the context of transformations in the labour process. The article illustrates how teachers and LSAs rely on mutuality, underpinned by moral norms of justice, and values of care, dignity and recognition, to cope with physically and emotionally demanding work that is under-resourced and undervalued. The analysis reveals that solidarity is not only against unjust workplace regimes, but also for connectivity and a humanised labour process.

Religion and Everyday Consumption Ethics: A Moral Economy Approach

As research on ethical consumers and consumption practices has continued to grow, a complimentary body of work concerned less with ethical consumption but more with ethics in consumption has emerged. Problematizing the divide between ethical and non-ethical consumption, this stream of research focuses on the domain of everyday and explores the moral struggles individuals face while engaging in ordinary consumption practices. However, the attention on the ordinary runs the risk of obscuring the contribution of the ‘extraordinary’ or the transcendental to the ethical concerns embedded in the mundane flow of the everyday. This study addresses this blind spot and explores the ways in which religion is implicated in everyday consumption ethics. In doing so, I go beyond a view of religion as an individual trait and emphasize its role as a major institutional structure of the contemporary political economy. The empirical context of the study is the controversy over the so-called halal nail polish. The debate over the products’ appropriateness for Muslim women provides a fertile setting to explore how an ordinary object becomes an ethical problem amid changing relations between religion and market. In order to trace and analyse the linkages between daily practices and institutional dynamics I draw from the moral economy framework and discuss the multiple and conflicting moral repertoires that shape the ethical evaluations of the object. The study offers several contributions to the existing theorizations of everyday consumption ethics and moral economies of consumption. It also highlights the potential of interdisciplinary approaches in providing a holistic understanding of the ethical and moral dimensions of consumption.

‘Customers were not objects to suck blood from’: Social relations in UK retail banks under changing performance management systems

AbstractUtilising an analytical framework informed by a moral economy approach, this article examines the social relationships between bank workers and customers in the context of changing performance management. Informed by 46 in‐depth interviews with branch workers and branch managers from UK banks, this article focusses on the interplay of the pressures arising from an intensified and all‐encompassing performance management system and bank workers lay morality. The article seeks to analyse why one group of bank workers engages with customers in a primarily instrumental manner, while another group tends to mediate and engage in oppositional practices which aim to avoid such an instrumentalisation. The article argues that moral economy gives voice to the agency of workers and the critical concerns of the social, economic and moral consequences of market‐driven and purely profit‐oriented workplace regimes.

Transitional Moments, Mediators, and Alternative Modernities

Transitional Moments, Mediators, and Alternative Modernities

Understanding Food System Resilience in Bali, Indonesia: A Moral Economy Approach

AbstractFood systems in Indonesia and other developing countries have witnessed a rapid change in production, trade, and consumption patterns. The central highlands and northeastern coast of Bali form one such system, with centuries of documented regional trade relations between coastal and highland communities whose food products were complementary. This paper adopts a moral economy approach to explain the decline in local food security at a systemic level, and to explore also how it may be reversed. In particular, I explore how this regional food system operated, and how modernization since the 1990s has compromised biodiversity, ecological sustainability, social resilience, and food security. Greater attention to this moral dimension of food systems, it is argued, will contribute to more successful agricultural development and food security programs.

‘If you are having a go at me, I am going to have a go at you’: the changing nature of social relationships of bank work under performance management

Over the last three decades work and employment in the private and public sector are increasingly subject to marketization processes. A defining feature of marketized employment is the rise of performance management systems (PMS). This article utilizes a novel framework of Sayer’s moral economy approach and labour process theory to explore the changing nature of bank work and social relationships between branch managers and branch workers before and after the implementation of PMS in UK banks. This article illustrates how the social and moral texture of the social relationships between branch workers and their managers deteriorated after the implementation of PMS, resulting in the rise of hostile forms of engagement.

Moral Matters: De‐Romanticising Worker Agency and Charting Future Directions for Labour Geography

AbstractThe rise of labour geography over the last 20 years has ensured that labour politics, worker rights and employment‐related struggles have remained strong themes in economic geography. This article provides an updated review of labour geography's development, charting its expansion from an early focus on organised spatial ‘resistance’ at a range of scales, to a more varied project incorporating a wider range of analytical and empirical inquiries. Despite this progression the paper suggests that work is still needed to address a gap in moral considerations within labour geography as a whole. Specifically a moral economy approach is offered as a means of explaining the decision‐making processes/rationales behind worker actions in the context of particular struggles. This includes a necessary focus on less celebratory, ethical or successful forms of coping with labour market challenges on the part of workers than have typically been discussed in the case studies of labour geography.

Normative Power Europe in the Maghreb: A Moral Economy Perspective on the Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Agreements

The European Union has loudly voiced its intention to facilitate both social prosperity and democratisation in North Africa. EU officials claim that the stabilisation of the Maghreb will reduce security threats – as well as migration flows – to the EU-28, as well as improve the lives of ordinary citizens in the region. In particular, the EU seeks to conclude Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Agreements (DCFTAs) with Tunisia, Morocco and Egypt. These are seen as a vital response to the Arab Spring – integrating North African countries into the globalised economy, and resulting in 'win-win' outcomes for all concerned. This paper argues, however, that European elites’ pursuit the DCFTAs calls into question the ethical dimensions of EU relations with the Maghreb. While Normative Power Europe seeks to build more tranquil societies in North Africa, nevertheless, its trade policies threaten to exacerbate inequalities and social unrest. Notably, the prospect of deindustrialisation in manufacturing sectors in wake of DCFTAs will do much to entrench economic asymmetries between the European metropole and its neighbours. Utilising a moral economy approach (qua Andrew Sayer), the article argues that emerging success stories such as Morocco and Tunisia should contest European trade prerogatives on the normative terrain established by European officials themselves – that is, in terms of poverty and stability impacts.

A moral economy approach to Africa-EU ties: the case of the European Investment Bank

AbstractThe European Union's (EU) trade and development ‘partnership’ with the African, Caribbean, and Pacific (ACP) countries has long interested scholars of North-South relations. Historically, the theoretical literature on ACP-EU ties has been characterised by liberal institutionalist accounts of interdependence and critical assessments of Europe's neo-colonialism. In the timeframe of the Cotonou Agreement (2000–20), this division has expressed itself in relation to liberal assessments of Europe's pursuit of pro-poor market reforms in the Post-Washington Consensus and critical accounts of Europe's neoliberal ‘development’ agenda. This article argues that amoral political economyoffers an innovative lens for the latter critical assessment of ACP-EU ties. With a constructivist focus on Europe's normative ‘development’ agenda, a moral economy standpoint may draw attention to the EU's role in (re)embedding poverty through recourse to legitimating ethical discourse. This is seen to enable the critical school to more closely consider ideational/discursive power in response to contemporary liberal institutionalist accounts. The article focuses on the European Investment Bank (EIB) and its activities in ACP countries – with particular focus on the Bank's Investment Facility (IF) – as an exemplar of the disjuncture between norms and outcomes.

Work, employment and society through the lens of moral economy

In this article a moral economy approach is proposed that is informed by Karl Polanyi and E. P. Thompson, who capture the ubiquitous tension between a stable, moral and human society and the economic practices of self-regulating markets, and by Andrew Sayer’s consideration of lay morality. Moral economy is an analytical framework that gives voice to critical concerns for the workings of an increasingly disconnected capitalism, its inherent tendencies to treat labour as a ‘fictitious commodity’ and the impact this has on the well-being of individuals and wider society. Hence, at the heart of the approach suggested here is a normative understanding of mutual reciprocality and embedded sociality that raises questions about how to support the human capacity to flourish.

‘MORAL ECONOMY’ AND PEASANT REVOLUTION IN RUSSIA: 1861–1918

The ‘moral economy’ thesis was first propounded by E. P. Thompson and then developed by James C. Scott, and centres on the idea that in pre-capitalist societies social relations are grounded in a p...

The Moral Dynamics of Riots in Contemporary Australia

Editor’s Note: In July 2006, Current Issues in Criminal Justice (volume 18 number 1) published an article entitled ‘Moral Indignation, Criminality and the Rioting Crowd inMacquarie Fields’ by John Owen. The following article is, for the most part, a reply to many of the positions raised contemporaneously and since then, including those of Murray Lee in ‘The Blame Game: Struggles over the Representation of the“Macquarie Fields Riots”’,Outrageous! Moral Panics in Australia (Poynting & Morgan eds); Don Weatherburn in ‘Riots, Policing and Social Disadvantage’,Current Issues in Criminal Justice volume 18 number 1; and Rob White in‘Swarming and the Social Dynamics of Group Violence’, Trends & Issues in Criminal Justice no 326 (AIC). It is a defence of the indignation /moral economy approach developed in Owen’s 2006 article.

Chipping Away at the State: Workers' Resistance and the Demise of East Germany

This article is a study of everyday resistance and political protest among East German workers under communism. It develops and adduces evidence for two hypotheses based on evidence from Communist Party and state archives. First, in contrast to the standard explanation for the revolution of 1989, which emphasizes intellectual and popular mobilization against the regime, this essay emphasizes the long-term capacity of otherwisepowerless workers to immobilize the regime through nonpolitical acts of everyday resistance. This resistance, coupled with the rare act of political protest, rendered ineffective the conventional methods of labor discipline and undermined any hope of meaningful economic reform. The second hypothesis concerns the motivation for working-class behavior. Two models of social action have dominated studies of subalterns: rational choice and moral economy. The models are evaluated against the archival record. While the evidence is not overwhelmingly in favor of either model, the moral economy approach provides a better account of the sporadic acts of rebellion and the myriad acts of everyday resistance.