A Sea of Debt
Law and Economic Life in the Western Indian Ocean, 1780–1950

An innovative legal history of economic life in the Western Indian Ocean, charting the emergence of a trans-oceanic contractual culture.

Fahad Ahmad Bishara (Author)

9781316609378, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 23 March 2017

292 pages, 8 b/w illus. 1 map 2 tables
23 x 15.2 x 1.5 cm, 0.43 kg

'… essential reading for anyone interested in the Indian Ocean world, Islam, economic life, and of course, the law.' Johan Mathew, H-IslamInAfrica

In this innovative legal history of economic life in the Western Indian Ocean, Bishara examines the transformations of Islamic law and Islamicate commercial practices during the emergence of modern capitalism in the region. In this time of expanding commercial activity, a mélange of Arab, Indian, Swahili and Baloch merchants, planters, jurists, judges, soldiers and seamen forged the frontiers of a shared world. The interlinked worlds of trade and politics that these actors created, the shared commercial grammars and institutions that they developed and the spatial and socio-economic mobilities they engaged in endured until at least the middle of the twentieth century. This major study examines the Indian Ocean from Oman to India and East Africa over an extended period of time, drawing together the histories of commerce, law and empire in a sophisticated, original and richly textured history of capitalism in the Islamic world.

Prologue
1. Life and debt
2. Inscribing obligation
3. Paper routes
Interlude
4. Translating transactions
5. Making Africa Indian
6. Muslim mortgages
7. Capital moves
8. Unravelling obligation
Epilogue.

Subject Areas: Legal history [LAZ], Economic history [KCZ], Islam [HRH], Maritime history [HBTM], Middle Eastern history [HBJF1], Asian history [HBJF]