Reading and interpreting Ibn Khaldun's economic philosophy

Souaiaia E. Ahmed (2023), Reading and interpreting Ibn Khaldun's economic philosophy. The Journal of Philosophical Economics: Reflections on Economic and Social Issues, XVI (Annual issue), 100-129.

31 Pages Posted: 30 Nov 2023

See all articles by Ahmed Souaiaia

Ahmed Souaiaia

University of Iowa; University of Washington

Date Written: August 25, 2023

Abstract

This work aims to present key concepts, ideas, and events that can be derived mainly from Ibn Khaldun’s chapter on economic life, which he captures with the heading, Chapter on Making a Living (ma`āsh). Justifying this undertaking is the significance of Ibn Khaldun’s contributions, the scarcity of translations of his work, and the dependency of secondary interpretive works on a single English translation. While a reading of Ibn Khaldun’s economic philosophy through a textual analysis of the primary sources remains the focus of this work, a sampling of the interpretive and translation works is also presented here in order to understand the level of engagement of non-Arabic scholars with Ibn Khaldun’s work and as a frame of mind with which economic philosophers and social historians might engage.

Keywords: theories of work, systems thinking, urbanization, civilization, Islamic social history

JEL Classification: B1

Suggested Citation

Souaiaia, Ahmed, Reading and interpreting Ibn Khaldun's economic philosophy (August 25, 2023). Souaiaia E. Ahmed (2023), Reading and interpreting Ibn Khaldun's economic philosophy. The Journal of Philosophical Economics: Reflections on Economic and Social Issues, XVI (Annual issue), 100-129., Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4633557

Ahmed Souaiaia (Contact Author)

University of Iowa ( email )

314 Gilmore Hall
Iowa City, IA 52242-1097
United States

University of Washington

Seattle, WA 98195
United States

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