Tales from two cities: financialisation, consumerism and affordable housing in Kuala Lumpur and Jakarta

This chapter reviews some of the key principles of Islamic finance. It discusses the contribution of an everyday political economy approach to understanding the political and social consequences of the region’s rapid urban transformation and the related emergence of a politically increasingly influential – and vocal – ‘middle class’. The chapter focuses on developments in Kuala Lumpur and Jakarta, respectively. It seeks to bring to the fore some of the entanglements between state-led development, financialisation and household debt. Islamic finance – despite its moral claims – has been made complicit in the region’s financialisation. The Jakarta case study is the product of a much more focused period of research in November 2016, when 20 interviews were conducted with women from low-income backgrounds, residing in kampungs, evicted sites and new public housing developments. The chapter aims to understand the gendered nature of community life before and after urban dispossession and the impact on everyday economic life