Individual and society in an Islamic ethical framework : Exploring key terminologies and the micro-foundations of Islamic economics

Purpose – The paper aims to produce new key terminologies for the microfoundations of Islamic economics. The paper attempts to investigate the microfoundations of Islamic economics by exploring new perspective in the key concepts and key terminologies that would explain the behavior of individual and society in an Islamic ethical framework. Design/methodology/approach – The paper is a conceptual paper that attempts to explore the microfoundations of Islamic economics from the primary sources of Qur’anic texts. Literature on the topics, from an Islamic and mainstream economics perspective, are reviewed critically in a comparative perspective. Findings – The key concepts of self-interest, utility maximization and rationality are critically evaluated in an Islamic perspective and new key concepts of huquq , maslahah maximization and taqwa are proposed as alternatives. Those new key terminologies will broaden the horizon in understanding of economic realities of man and society and their relationship and well-being. Research limitations/implications – The paper is based on conceptual explorations of literature in the microfoundations of economics in the mainstream economics and Islamic economics. This is a conceptual paper, so it did not use any empirical analysis. Practical implications – The findings of this paper will give insights of the microfoundations of Islamic economics as a discipline. Those unique key terminologies derived from the textual source of Islam ( nusus ) and intellectual tradition ( turath ) are important in the attempt to develop a solid body of knowledge. Originality/value – The paper proposes new key concepts and terminologies to be the microfoundations of Islamic economics as a discipline. It is a new approach in understanding behavior of individual and society in Islamic perspective which are different from the other approach, which modifies the conventional terminologies by adding “Islamic” prefix, such as “Islamic” utility or “Islamic” rationality.