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This paper explores the experience of “Shari’a” as non-state law in the English courts through a historical analysis of past Islamic finance dispute resolutions (IFDRs). This paper aims to propose a conceivable scenario relating to the law applicable in international commercial contracts in the English courts with the emergence of the Hague Principles 2015.

This paper addresses several issues that have been raised in English case law: doubts about the legal nature of “Shari’a” as non-state law; the limits placed on freedom of choice of “Shari’a” law by the application of a single legal system; and the distinction between application of law and incorporation by reference of “Shari’a” in IFDRs. The paper then analyses the conformity of “Shari’a” with the provisions now used to resolve Islamic finance disputes (trade and investment) in the English courts, using an empirical analysis of The Accounting and Auditing Organization for Islamic Financial Institutions standards.

The paper provides that, in theory, “Shari’a” standards could play a significant role in IFDRs after Brexit, even though a gap persists in practice because the Hague Principles 2015 have not yet been adopted by the English legal system.

The study focuses on the English courts and shows how the IFDRs could be resolved with the emergence of Hague Principles 2015 in the post-Brexit era.

To the best of the author’s knowledge, this paper appears to be the first paper to provide a conceivable scenario relating to the future of the IFDRs in the English courts.

This paper aims to examine the options available to arbitrators when they suspect money laundering during arbitration proceedings, considering their compatibility with fundamental principles and concepts of arbitration.

Using a doctrinal analysis approach, the paper draws on legal principles, antimoney laundering regulations and relevant literature to explore the topic. It considers relevant international treaties, standards set by the financial action task force on money laundering, cases and arguments from legal analysts and experts.

The paper identifies three options for arbitrators: disregarding suspicions, initiating an investigation or terminating the proceedings. Disregarding suspicions is deemed inappropriate, as it may facilitate the concealment of financial crimes. Initiating an investigation is seen as a preferable option, aligning with the arbitrator’s role and the public interest in nullifying contracts linked to criminal conduct. Terminating the proceedings is not recommended, as it contradicts the principle of natural justice. The paper emphasizes the importance of reasonable grounds for suspicions, notifying the parties, and allowing them to address the concerns.

This paper contributes to the existing literature by comprehensively analyzing the compatibility of these options with arbitration principles and concepts. It underscores the need for clear laws and directives to guide arbitrators in addressing financial crimes within the arbitration process, maintaining a balance between party autonomy and preventing the misuse of arbitration for illicit activities.

The aim of the present study is to shed light on the role of legal practitioners, namely, lawyers and notaries, in the fight against money laundering: Are they considered as facilitators or obstacles against money laundering? How does the global and the EU legal framework deal with the legal professionals?

The research follows a deductive approach attempting to respond to questions such as: How do the lawyers’ and notaries’ societies react in front of the anti-money laundering measures that concern them and why? What are the discrepancies between the lawyers’ professional secrecy and the obligations that EU anti-money laundering legislation assigns them?

This study disclosures the response of the European union and international legal and regulatory framework as well as the reflexes of the international and European legal professionals’ associations to this danger. It also demonstrates the reaction of lawyers against European union anti-money laundering legislation, to the point that it limits not only the confidentiality principle but also the position of the European judicial systems to the contradiction between this principle and the lawyers’ obligation to report their suspicions to the authorities.

To fulfil the study goals, it was necessary to overcome some obstacles, like the limitation of existing sources. Indeed, transnational empirical research considering the professionals who facilitate money laundering is narrow. Besides, policymakers and academics only recently expressed more interest in money laundering and its facilitators.

This paper fulfils an identified need to study the legal professionals’ role not only in money laundering practices but also in anti-money laundering policies.

This study aims to develop a comprehensive insolvency model tailored to Islamic banks, ensuring alignment with Shariah principles throughout pre-insolvency, bankruptcy and post-bankruptcy stages.

The research adopts a qualitative research method, using a desktop research approach. Primary sources and secondary sources are examined to gather information and draw conclusions.

This study presents a comprehensive insolvency model designed for Islamic banks, rooted in Shariah principles. The model covers pre-insolvency, bankruptcy (taflis) and post-bankruptcy stages, incorporating key Shariah parameters to ensure adherence to Islamic finance principles. It addresses challenges such as adapting to dynamic financial landscapes and varying interpretations of Shariah principles. Notably, the model recognizes the separate legal personality of Islamic banks and emphasizes transparency, fairness and compliance with religious obligations. In the post-bankruptcy stage, directors are urged to voluntarily settle remaining debts, aligning with ethical and Shariah-compliant standards.

The study contributes to the stability and growth of Shariah-compliant financial systems by extending insolvency principles to Islamic banks, providing a foundation for future research and policymaking specific to this context.

This paper aims to investigate the zakat disclosure of Islamic banks at the global level. It is important for depositors and shareholders of Islamic banks to know whether the bank is paying zakat on their behalf or not. Additionally, disclosing the calculation method used is also necessary to eliminate uncertainties resulting from ambiguous reporting that can mislead the stakeholders. This issue becomes more obvious when considering that depositors and shareholders may have different accounts with different Islamic banks, which makes it quite confusing to have multiple ways of zakat calculation or different approaches on who is the party that pays it. This study analyzes the current practices across 13 countries and recommends best practices.

The objective of the paper objective is achieved through analyzing the annual reports of 34 Islamic banks in 13 countries for the years 2014 and 2019. It further quantifies the zakat disclosure by constructing a zakat disclosure index. This index considers the disclosure of four major constituents covering the amount and the responsibility for payment, the calculation method, the involvement of the Shariah board and the zakat duty on investment account holders. For further robustness, this study is further supported by content analysis measures using the zakat word count in annual reports.

The results indicate a major issue in zakat disclosure. The overall average of disclosure index is low. Most of the banks disclose limited information about zakat, such as the amount and the responsibility for payment, in their annual reports. Less than 40% of the examined banks disclose information about the role of the Shariah board in zakat calculation, and a very limited number of banks (9%) are found to disclose enough details about the zakat calculation method. Furthermore, none of the examined banks mentions the zakat due for the investment accounts. Overall, zakat disclosure of most of the banks, whether following Accounting and Auditing Organization for Islamic Financial Institutions or otherwise, are found to be not up to the expected best practices.

Among the limitations of this study is the sole dependence on annual reports of Islamic banks without considering other means that banks might be using to communicate zakat-related matters to stakeholders. Examples of such means include a website, social media and other direct or indirect marketing materials. Additionally, the results of this study shall not be overgeneralized regarding differences between countries because the sample does not include all Islamic banks in the selected country. Future research may use the proposed zakat disclosure index on a country-specific data sample.

The findings have significant implications as they raise a serious concern regarding the sufficiency of the Islamic banks’ disclosure about a core area of their responsibility, that is, the zakat. The index developed can be a tentative measure of zakat disclosure transparency pending further review. The result further suggests looking at the composition of members of Shariah boards to include at least one member with a sound accounting background. Zakat is a religious duty; therefore, a perceived lack of transparency on the amount, method of calculation and how the zakat is paid may affect the future injection of capital into Islamic banks.

An important contribution of this paper lies in the fact that the collected data is not provided in any available database. Rather, it is manually captured from the individual annual reports of reviewed Islamic banks. Further, this paper proposes an index to measure the zakat disclosure at bank and country levels.

The purpose of this study include analyzing the conformity between the General Guidelines for the Governance of the Indonesian Sharia Entities (GGG-ISE) and the implementation in the field and proposing a model of corporate governance for Islamic property developers.

This research uses a qualitative method with a case study approach. The researcher used a structured interview method and chose a purposive technique to determine the interviewees. This study has seven interviewees representing three Islamic property developer companies in Jember Regency, East Java, Indonesia. Data collection was conducted from June to July 2023, with a duration of about 60 min for each interviewee. The interviews were conducted face-to-face in each interviewee’s residential office.

The results showed that the companies had implemented several principles of GGG-ISE, namely, ethical and responsible actors, risk management, internal control, compliance, disclosure and transparency by making financial reports, shareholder rights and stakeholder rights, both internal and external stakeholders. Furthermore, this study found that GGG-ISE does not comply with the components of the organizing organ group. This study also found that governance reports have not been implemented in GGG-ISE components. In addition, this study identified a new component that must be present and not found in GGG-ISE, namely, a statement of the use of contracts for mudharib owners and between mudharib owners and stakeholders. Based on these findings, this study proposes a governance model for Islamic property developer companies called the GGG-IPDE.

This research is a pioneer in proposing a corporate governance model for Islamic property developers.

This research is very important to conduct to review government policy on Indonesian contract law that still uses contract law inherited from Dutch product (BW) and review which regulations are to be adapted to current development of contract law. This research’s novelty is that new rules will be found in Indonesian contract law.

This research used normative and empirical methods. Normative research is dogmatic research or one that analyzes legislation using secondary data consisting of primary, secondary and tertiary legal materials. Besides the normative method, the research was also conducted using empirical method through direct interview and observation in some government agencies, such as the Directorate General of Legislation, Ministry of Law and Human Rights (HAM) and Chairman of Legal Product Formation Division, House of People’s Representatives of the Republic of Indonesia and the Civil Law Teaching Association (APHK).

This research found that new Indonesian contract law is very important to give legal certainty and justice to the people, and the contract law must regulate important matters related to the sources of contract besides agreement and law, related to termination, unjust enrichment, negotiation, good faith, public contract and private contract and related to legal act and validity of electronic contract.

The novelty of this research is that new rules will be found in Indonesian contract law. This research is different from previous researches conducted by Sigit Irianto (2013) and Deviana Yuanitasari (2020), that discuss only on contract law development related only to the good faith principle.

Drafting contract law is a relatively heavy duty due to the factor of law pluralism that contains contract aspect in Indonesia such as customary law aspect, Islamic law aspect, regional aspect, international aspect and other aspects. In fact, meanwhile, there is rapid development in the community with regard to business transactions that are also followed with contract law development. Therefore, amendment is needed for the Indonesian contract law to adapt to the people’s need for law, and this change agenda is also addressed to updating the contract law.

Civil law reform, especially contract law, is deemed very important for Indonesia, because based on field fact, people do their business contract by applying contract law that is not yet regulated in the contract law in KUHPerdata; thus, new contract law is needed that regulates important matters related to sources other than agreement and law.

It is very important to conduct this research to review government policy in Indonesian contract law that still uses the contract law inherited from Dutch product (BW) and review what regulations should have been adjusted to current development of contract law. The novelty of this research is that new rules will be found in Indonesian contract law. This research is different from previous researches conducted by Sigit Irianto (2013) and Deviana Yuanitasari (2020), that discuss only on contract law development related only to the good faith principle.

The purpose of the paper is to analyze the new Bankruptcy Law in Saudi Arabia (KSA Bankruptcy Law) under both a comparative lens and a policy-oriented one, while highlighting some of the most essential operational steps and procedures in a bankruptcy proceeding under the law.

The approach adopted analyzes the specific mechanics and procedures of a bankruptcy law under the general policies and goals of bankruptcy. Additionally, where appropriate, a brief comparison to the US Bankruptcy code and its provisions is presented to provide an alternative approach on how similar issues are handled under a reputable and proven bankruptcy system.

Overall, the KSA Bankruptcy Law is a major accomplishment and advancement to the Kingdom’s insolvency regime. The law consolidated and codified the laws governing bankruptcy under the Kingdom’s prior regime, and followed the structure of a modern bankruptcy regime. In doing so, several of the law’s policies and objectives have been fulfilled by providing an effective, predictable and reliable bankruptcy system.

Given the relatively recent adoption of the KSA Bankruptcy Law, the paper provides a comprehensive assessment of the law’s operation and its effectiveness in achieving its policy goals as a modern bankruptcy law.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the link between corporate social responsibility (CSR) and the amount of trust customers have in Somali Islamic banks. Furthermore, the role of gender in CSR activities and Islamic bank clientele is evaluated.

Throughout February and March 2022, 410 clients of Islamic banks in Somalia were surveyed using a questionnaire. The partial least squares approach and the structural equation model are applied to examine the data.

Findings indicate that all variables of CSR activities, such as social product, social legal, social needs, social environment and social employees’ responsibility, are influential and significant predictors of trust in Islamic banks in Somalia. Gender inequalities moderate the relationship between social product, social needs, social environment, social employee and trust. Conversely, only social legal responsibility was unaffected by gender differences in Somalia regarding people’s trust in Islamic banks.

A sample from a developing country such as Somalia is useful for shedding light on the outcomes of consumers’ perceptions of and trust in businesses’ CSR in the developing world. Furthermore, this study contributes to knowledge regarding CSR and how it can help the Islamic banking industry. Its findings will be useful to policymakers and regulatory bodies in the banking industry in their efforts to improve CSR.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first empirical investigation of its kind about the understudied relationship among customer trust, CSR efforts and gender in Somalia context. Furthermore, it investigates how gender specifically moderates CSR in the Islamic banking sector in a developing country.