Research trends in the field of Islamic Social Finance

This paper is a bibliometric study of the literature in Islamic social finance. The study analyses 595 articles, conference papers, and book chapters in Islamic social finance from 1991 to 2020 published in 262 Scopus indexed journals. The authors sourced the bibliographic data using the keywords “Islam and social finance,” “waqf,” “zakat,” “microfinance,” and variations thereof. This study is essential, especially in the wake of COVID-19 pandemic and the pandemic-induced economic disruption leading to increased global income and social inequalities, putting even more pressure on the SDGs funding gap. Novel solutions to plug the funding Gap are being sought, and recent literature has shown Islamic social finance’s potential as a solution to the SDG’s funding gap. The study finds that researchers in the field closely link Islamic social finance with sustainability and sustainable development concepts, as evidenced in keywords used by authors. We also find that Malaysia and Indonesia are leading the research in ISF. The study aims to map the field of Islamic social finance and provide a reference point for future researchers to identify the gaps in the literature and their role in enriching academic discourse in ISF to position Islamic finance appropriately in the sphere of development economics.