A Just Economy? Unifying and Dividing the Islamic Intellectual Field in Neoliberal Turkey

In this paper, I argue that the relationship between religion and neoliberalism in non-Western contexts cannot be understood without paying attention to the contested, dynamic, and fluid production of local knowledge. In order to substantiate this argument, I trace debates about development, equality, class, labor, and wealth that circulate in the Islamic intellectual field in Turkey. Specifically, I analyze the viewpoints of three contemporary Turkish Muslim intellectuals who make different claims about Islam’s economic teachings. Mustafa Özel proposes “entrepreneurial Islam” as an alternative to state-regulated capitalism, Ihsan Eliaçık argues that “social Islam” ordains Muslims to redistribute wealth, whereas Lütfi Bergen suggests that “pastoral Islam” precedes Western capitalist modernity. I find that the disputed notion of a just economy is what unifies and divides this intellectual field as a constitutive question that is disagreed upon. This article thus calls for a recognition of the contingency, multiplicity, and indeterminacy of Islamic-neoliberal assemblages.