Teaching Islamic Finance through Digital Bank Operations: Sharia Governance as a Management Problem

Abstract

Islamic finance classrooms still over-teach contract names and under-teach how a Sharia board, a product owner and a core-banking team actually disagree. This paper reports an ALU module redesign using redacted product files from digital banks in Bahrain, Malaysia-facing Gulf desks, and Saudi fintechs. Students who worked the operating files wrote stronger risk and governance essays than students who only memorised murabaha steps. Industry guest clinics in Arabic and English were essential; English-only clinics lost precision on fatwa language. Arab Leadership University should treat Islamic finance as contemporary Arab financial infrastructure. A tuition-free digital MBA that ignores Sharia governance is not serving the region it names.