Social Policy in the Islamic World offers an excellent glimpse into the social policies of a myriad of states and societies belonging to what is called the ‘Muslim’ or ‘Islamic World’. From the outset, the book sets out the problematic of whether the Muslim World is a thing that actually exists and attempts to answer this question through an examination of its social policies. In this sense, the aim of this book is two-fold. First, it attempts to determine conceptually if there are coherent definitional boundaries to the notion of ‘Islamic Social Policy’ and second it examines empirically how social policy is practiced in Muslim majority countries.

The first part of the book approaches the first aim by examining theoretically, what Islamic social policy means in a series of four chapters with wholly different views. The first chapter by Tajmazinani (2021) and Mazinani take the view that an examination of the original sources in Islam provide a clear conceptual understanding of what Islamic social policy should be. Jawad and Essed, on the other hand, provide an analysis which suggests that social welfare practices within Muslim societies is a product of both their beliefs and the sociopolitical environment in which they live creating ‘Muslim worlds’ instead of one overarching Muslim World (p. 54). In the third chapter, Saeidnia and Ruiz de Elvira take an entirely different view suggesting that separating religious and secular conceptualisations of social welfare provision is problematic and that all actors within the social welfare nexus should be viewed in the framework of ‘doing good’ (p. 64). Finally, Bilo and Machado discuss the importance of examining legal structures when considering social policies in Muslim states.

In the second part, authors examine social policies in a series of case studies from states as diverse as Algeria to Azerbaijan to Malaysia. As Tajmazinani mentions in the introduction, the purpose of this diverse group of case studies is to gain as much variation as possible around the unit of study, the practice of social policy in Muslim states. In this sense, the only unifying factor behind these studies is that they are in states with predominantly Muslim populations. By examining cases in this way, one can determine whether a unified set of Islamic social policies can be found in practice.

The book provides an excellent illustration of the extreme differences in social policies, and likewise, how influenced they are by the historical and political realities of each state. The major shortcoming, however, is that many of the case studies offer only limited analysis on the role Islam has in the development of these states' policies, while other chapters ignore the question completely. From these analyses, it is not clear how we can conclude whether Islamic social policy is a coherent conceptual entity if we do not know the role Islam has, if any, on the development of these policies.

Overall, the book offers an excellent glimpse into the social policies of a number of Muslim states. This is a field that faces a severe dearth in research, so the book offers an excellent contribution. Unfortunately, it does not offer the conceptual groundwork that would propel this type of research into the future. A recurring theme throughout the book suggests that due to the muddled and contradictory conceptualisations of what Islamic social policy is among social welfare actors, the policies of Muslim states have become muddled and contradictory. After reading this book, I have come to no clearer understanding of what it might be.

伊斯兰世界的社会政策提供了对属于所谓“穆斯林”或“伊斯兰世界”的无数国家和社会的社会政策的绝佳一瞥。这本书从一开始就提出了穆斯林世界是否真实存在的问题，并试图通过对其社会政策的考察来回答这个问题。从这个意义上说，本书的目的有两个。首先，它试图从概念上确定“伊斯兰社会政策”的概念是否存在连贯的定义界限，其次，它从经验上检验了社会政策在穆斯林占多数的国家是如何实施的。

本书的第一部分通过从理论上探讨伊斯兰社会政策的含义，在一系列观点完全不同的四个章节中实现了第一个目标。第一章 Tajmazinani ( 2021 )) 和 Mazinani 认为，对伊斯兰教的原始资料的审查提供了对伊斯兰教社会政策应该是什么的清晰概念理解。另一方面，Jawad 和 Essed 提供的分析表明，穆斯林社会中的社会福利实践是他们的信仰和他们所生活的社会政治环境的产物，他们创造了“穆斯林世界”，而不是一个总体的穆斯林世界（第 10 页）。 54)。在第三章中，Saeidnia 和 Ruiz de Elvira 采取了完全不同的观点，认为将社会福利提供的宗教和世俗概念分开是有问题的，社会福利关系中的所有参与者都应该在“做好事”的框架内看待（p . 64). 最后，

在第二部分中，作者从阿尔及利亚、阿塞拜疆到马来西亚等不同国家的一系列案例研究中审视了社会政策。正如 Tajmazinani 在引言中提到的那样，这组多样化案例研究的目的是围绕研究单元，即穆斯林国家的社会政策实践，获得尽可能多的变化。从这个意义上说，这些研究背后的唯一统一因素是它们位于以穆斯林为主的州。通过这种方式审查案例，可以确定是否可以在实践中找到一套统一的伊斯兰社会政策。

这本书很好地说明了社会政策的极端差异，同样，它们如何受到每个州的历史和政治现实的影响。然而，主要缺点是许多案例研究仅对伊斯兰教在这些国家政策发展中的作用进行了有限的分析，而其他章节则完全忽略了这个问题。从这些分析来看，如果我们不知道伊斯兰教在这些政策的发展中所起的作用（如果有的话），那么我们如何得出伊斯兰社会政策是否是一个连贯的概念实体的结论尚不清楚。

总体而言，这本书很好地了解了一些穆斯林国家的社会政策。这是一个面临严重缺乏研究的领域，因此本书提供了出色的贡献。不幸的是，它没有提供将此类研究推向未来的概念基础。贯穿全书的一个反复出现的主题表明，由于社会福利参与者对伊斯兰社会政策的概念混乱和矛盾，穆斯林国家的政策变得混乱和矛盾。读完这本书后，我对它可能是什么没有更清楚的理解。