An Empirical Investigation on the Role of Barakah in the Islamic Theory of Consumer Choice

Conventional consumer theory biased toward western values.Eventhough there is a soaring claim of being free from any value, but,the fact shows that the formulation of act/on resulted from westerneconomic analysis biases strongly toward the core ofwestern value, thatis, individualistic value. However; the value loaded in western theoryofconsumer choice does not match the islamic teaching. In this paper, atheoretical model implied by lslammic values which represents thebehaviour ofMoslem consumer in choosing goods among alternatives.From empirical evidence, the results show that awareness, consistencyand neutrality come loge/her and simultaneously, it is safe to say thatawareness implies consistency. While consistency further impliesneutrality. This means that the revelation-deduction-based predictionover the relationship between awareness, consistency and neutralitymeets reality. This shows that Moslem consumers does aware of theexistence and the extent ofbarakah in the product they are consideringto buy. They also behave rationally in that they make a consistentbuying decision based on their investigation. Finally, when seeing twogoods with different barakah content they will find it easy to neglect theone with no barakah in it eventhough the price is lower. This furtherimplies that the practice of Islamic theory of consumption does exist,and therefore, abort the accusition that Islamic economics is merelynormative.