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Originally Posted by HansTWN
From what I have read about these financial service offerings the difference mostly lies in the kind of investments offered, which are based on religious values. Meaning, for example, Playboy and pork producers are out (no matter how much money they can make).
I see your point regarding magazines on the street. But there authorities have easy control. They can take action any time they think someone has overstepped the boundaries. How do you control ebooks? That is why I believe everybody will be happy with the current system. People from muslim countries can easily find a way to buy Amazon ebooks and the Kindle. But everything remains a little hush hush instead of it being a bold announcement that would bring on a lot of unnecessary problems.
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You are correct in that Muslims are forbidden to invest in certain types of businesses such as the ones that you mention. The incompatability goes deeper than this, however. Islam prohibits "riba" or interest on loans as well as the buying and selling of debt. For this reason, modern finance capitalism is incompatible with the Islamic economic system on a fundamental level. Obviously, this does not prevent individual Muslims and Muslim countries from ignoring these prohibitions, just as the Catholic Church ignored its centuries old prohibition on usury. While I have no doubt that there a Muslim governments that seek this level of control over their populations, from the point of view of the Islamic Shariah, what goes on in the home and does not spill out into public is not the concern of the state. This was established during the early period of Islam. The problem is not one of religion per se; it's more governments with over-wheening authority using shallow interpretations of religion as a pretext to extend their control over civil life.
Luqman