ABSTRACT
In the early 1990s, a group of distinguished Muslim scholars met at Chateau Chinon in France to consider the problems faced by Muslim communities in Europe. They decided that Islamic political theory could no longer classify nonMuslim states as d‰r al-‡arb (the domain of war); instead, the West was to be considered d‰r al-‘ahd (the domain of treaty), signifying a willingness towards greater dialogue.1 In the spring of 1996, Citicorp announced the launching of an Islamic banking unit which would cater to ‘investors and businesses requiring special financial services conforming to Islamic law’.2 They were hoping to tap into the estimated $120 billion currently on deposit in various Islamic banks around the world.
