Four Nuances of Islamic Finance Research: A Bibliometric Analysis Approach for Exploring the Structure of Research

Abstract

Background and Purpose: Islamic finance is an important driver of the economy for the Muslim world, particularly to the developing Muslim majority countries in Southeast Asia. Scholars continue to pay close attention to Islamic finance research because it differs from conventional finance in many ways. Islamic finance research, like other fields of study, has to take a step back to evaluate what has been accomplished, who has contributed, and what the trending research topics are throughout its development. To that end, this research aims to investigate the structure of Islamic finance research by identifying its key nuances to date.

Methodology: This study uses the VOSviewer program to perform bibliometric analysis techniques, particularly the citation, bibliographic coupling, and co-word analysis, to investigate the structure of Islamic finance research. The analyses were conducted by identifying the scientific journals that have a significant impact in the field based on a sample of 1,567 articles spanning the years 1955 to 2019, or 65 years of research.

Findings: The major findings of the study are the identification of the four key nuances that form the structure of Islamic finance research and the most referred publications for each of the nuances using citation, bibliometric coupling and co-word analysis. The key nuances include: 1) Bank performance, stability, corporate governance, and risk management; 2) Customer’s patronization and satisfaction factors; 3) Islamic microfinancing and social banking; and 4) Islamic capital market products and performance.

Contributions: This study presents an easy-to-read network of research nuances useful for understanding the Islamic finance literature and supporting future research in this field. The study also provides practical contributions to Islamic financial institutions by showing the major areas of focus to improve or sustain them in the industry.