Ethical Foundations of Exchange: A Thematic Synthesis of Micro-Conduct of Market Participants in the Holy Quran

Abstract

Markets depend on both informal institutions (norms and religious beliefs) and formal institutions. Historically, informal institutions have not been mapped onto modern institutional frameworks. The Holy Quran, although being a detailed source of such norms, has received little attention in this regard. This paper extends the thematic content analysis approach in Hassan (2026), focusing on verses governing market conduct and exchange. It builds on the economic categorization established in that paper and analyzes the verses categorized under "Market Regulations and Exchange". This paper takes the entire corpus of 30 Juz and 114 Surahs in Arabic with the Urdu and English translations and shortlists a total of 41 verses across 16 Surahs to deal with market conduct. This subset is then organized into five sub-themes, which are: mutual consent and contractual freedom; al-Mizan and measurement integrity; covenants, oaths, and trust; debt documentation; and the prohibited practices of riba and maysir. These clusters reflect a three-tiered institutional skeleton: what conditions are required to make an exchange permissible, what integrity requirements help make it work, and the limits defined to explain what makes an exchange legitimate. What differs from the economic framework is that the market and market regulations are seen from the lens of the Quran. This paper gives a thematic dataset of Quranic market-conduct requirements and relates them to the modern economic concepts.