Economic activity and achievements in the Muslim world

This chapter provides a broad socio-economic development picture of the Muslim majority countries (MMCs) and develops ‘stylised facts’ to offer some tentative analyses of underlying factors that might have played a role in these developments. The chapter suggests that there may be a number of factors (like the deficits in education, infrastructure, research and development, or democracy) to contribute to the low socio-economic progress in many MMCs. The most serious shortfall, given the unity of faith and the contiguity of geography, is the lack of economic integration among the MMCs. The chapter concludes that the MMCs must harness their complementarities, especially in terms of capital and labour, to accelerate progress.