In this pioneering work Siraj Sait and Hilary Lim address Islamic property and land rights, drawing on a range of socio-historical, classical and contemporary resources. They address the significance of Islamic theories of property and Islamic land tenure regimes on the 'webs of tenure' prevalent in the Muslim societies. They consider the possibility of using Islamic legal and human rights systems for the development of inclusive, pro-poor approaches to land rights. They also focus on Muslim women's rights to property and inheritance systems.
Engaging with institutions such as the Islamic endowment (waqf) and principles of Islamic microfinance, they test the workability of 'authentic' Islamic proposals. Located in human rights as well as Islamic debates, this study offers a well researched and constructive appraisal of property and land rights in the Muslim world.
Jane Pollard's research interests embrace geographies of money and finance and their intersection with regional economic development. Recent work explores the role of different financial intermediaries in regional economic development, entrepreneurs' construction and navigation of their financial networks and the diversity of financial and other knowledges that generate economic co-ordination in different social, cultural, religious and demographic contexts. Over the last decade she has published articles in journals such as Antipode, Area, the Journal of Economic Geography, Environment and Planning A, Geoforum, International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers and Urban Studies. Her recent book chapters include pieces in Pike et al. (2010) Handbook of local and regional economic development, Phillips (2009) Spaces of hope for Muslims (Zed Books) and Fuller et al. (2009) Interrogating alterity (Ashgate). She sits on the Editorial Boards of the Journal of Economic Geography, Geography Compass and Growth and Change.
Cheryl McEwan's main research interests include the geographies of citizenship, democracy and transformation in South Africa, the lived experiences of postcoloniality in the global North and South, and the role of postcolonial theory within social science research. Recent work explores the potentially productive engagement between postcolonial theory and development studies, and the role of ethical trade in transforming working conditions and engendering empowerment in South Africa's wine industry. She is author of Gender, Geography and Empire (Ashgate, 2000) and Postcolonialism and Development (Routledge, 2008), and is co-editor of Postcolonial Geographies (Continuum, 2002). She has published numerous articles in a wide range of journals in geography and the social sciences. She is currently Editor (Development Section) of Geography Compass and sits of the Editorial Board of the RGS-IBG/Blackwell Book Series.
Alex Hughes is Senior Lecturer in Economic Geography at Newcastle University in the UK. Her research focuses on commodity chains, ethical trade and the spatiality of corporate responsibility practised through supply chains. She has written on the dynamics of ethical codes in the Kenyan horticultural industry, the corporate strategies adopted by UK and US retailers with respect to the responsible management of their supply chains and the knowledge economies constructing ethical learning in this sector. She is co-editor (with Suzanne Reimer) of Geographies of Commodity Chains (2004).
