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Introduction
Islam recognizes the desirability of engagement in business activity. In Islam,
business activities can become part of ibadah (worship and obedience of Allah) if
they are performed in accordance with the commands of Allah and the Islamic code of
conduct (Ahmad, 1988). In Islam, man is perceived as the vicegerent of Allah on
earth, and Allah has made the universe subservient to him (Al-Quran 2:30; 14:32-33;
22:65; 31:20; 35:39 & 45:12-13). As vicegerent, it is mans duty to work hard to build
this world and to use its natural resources in the best possible manner in accordance
with Divine rules (Al-Quran 2:5; 6:153). In other words it can be said that there is no
separation in Islam on the worldly activities with the religious guidance.
However current business practices are separated from religion, in which to
some extent resulted in contradiction with Islamic morality (Hameed, 2000a).
Furthermore, current business practices are also equipped with accounting system,
which is more likely established to achieve the capitalistic socio-economic objective
(Sombart, 1919). This situation leads to the need of establishing an accounting
system that could attain the Islamic socio-economic objective of falah (the success in
the world and the hereafter). The importance of such efforts becomes definite along
with the development of Islamic financial institution in many parts of the world,
which operate under Islamic teachings (Shariah) basis.
1
The writer would like to thank Assoc. Prof. Dr. Shahul Hameed bin Hj Mohd Ibrahim, lecturer of
International Islamic University Malaysia, for his valuable comments and suggestions on this article
and for sharing a number of reading materials.
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146
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Research Methodology
Population and Sample
This research is conducted during August until October in the year 2002 in
Yogyakarta, a province located in Indonesia. In this research, Muslim accounting
academicians in that province would be taken as the research population. The
researcher would use the classification of Islamic and conventional background as
classification categories for these higher education institutions. Since there is no
Muslim accounting academician in the Christian and Catholic background higher
education institutions, the population of this research excludes these institutions and
confirmed to the remaining 18 higher education institutions in Yogyakarta. In total,
there are for about 235 Muslim accounting academicians as the population of this
research and about 30 % of them are Muslim accounting academicians who work at
the Islamic background institution. In this research, 87 respondents or 37% of the
population would be used as the research sample. Fifty six respondents or 64% of
total samples are from the conventional background and the other 36% are from the
Islamic background institutions.
Data Collecting Techniques
The researcher has used questionnaire in order to gather the data on the
perception of respondents on the Islamic accounting and demographic data of the
respondents. The questionnaire is distributed either directly to the respondents or to
the supervisor of the respondents, in this case the head of the accounting department
to be handed over to the academicians. One week after delivering the questionnaire,
the researcher went back for two or three times to collect the answered questionnaire.
For uncollected questionnaires, prepaid envelopes were supplied so that the
respondents could send them to the researcher by mail. Total number of
questionnaires distributed, were about 161 questionnaires and 76 of were collected
personally while 11 were posted by the respondents.
Table 1
Questionnaire Response Rate
No
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
Conventional
background
UPN
STIE Yo
STIE YKP
Unwama
UNY
UWM
UGM
STIE YKPN
UJB
Total Number
No.
Quest
distr.
No.
Quest
recev.
Re
sponse
rate
15
14
9
9
15
6
14
20
5
102
10
9
9
9
7
4
5
3
0
56
67 %
64 %
100 %
100 %
47 %
47 %
36 %
15 %
52 %
No
Islamic
Background
No.
Quest
distr.
No.
Quest
recev.
Re
sponse
rate
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
UMY
UII
UAD
STIE WW
STIE SBI
Uncok
12
21
10
10
2
4
11
8
6
4
2
0
92 %
38 %
55 %
40 %
100 %
0
Total
Number
59
31
53 %
It means that this research could achieve more than 52% response rate in total and
almost the same response rate was also obtained for both Islamic and conventional
background of institutions.
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Hypotheses
Hypothesis on appropriateness of conventional accounting for Islamic Business
Organization & Muslim User
Since conventional accounting has been widely used in Indonesia accounting
curriculum, there might be a possibility of perceiving it as appropriate for Islamic
business organization and Muslim users. Therefore hypothesis one on the
appropriateness of conventional accounting for Islamic business organization &
Muslim user is set up as follows.
Figure 1: hypothesis 1
Ho:
Ha:
Strongly
disagree
Disagree
Neither
Strongly
agree nor Agree
agree
disagree
Statement (a) is provided in an opposite way to what being concern of the issue of
Islamic accounting. If the answer of this statement indicates their disagreement, it
means that there is a need for different accounting rather than just using contemporary
accounting. Otherwise, the contemporary accounting would be appropriately used to
fulfill the need of Muslims users.
Hypothesis on the Impact of Different Background of Institutions on MAAs
Perception on the Conventional Accounting
Islamization of accounting education in Indonesia is formally conducted by
the universities with the Islamic background. In Yogyakarta province for example,
there are six higher education institutions with Islamic Backgrounds, which have
provided accounting department for bachelor degree. They are Universitas Ahmad
Dahlan, Universitas Muhammadiyah Yogyakarta, Universitas Islam Indonesia,
151
Ha:
To test this hypothesis, the respondent would be classified into two groups; those
working at the Islamic background institutions and those working at the conventional
background institutions. Then, by using the respondents answer on the perception on
Islamic and conventional accounting, the means of each group would be compared
and analyzed.
152
2
3
1
0
5
10
15
20
25
+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+
153
2. Q1C
Reliability Coefficients
N of Cases =
Alpha =
73.0
N of Items =
.8812
73
3.0548
1.0259
.1201
Through a two-tail t-test, it is found that the acceptance of the alternative hypothesis
is not significant (see table 5), whereby the obtained t (.456) is less than the critical t
value (1.994). This means that the possibility to get the same result is very low if the
same test would be conducted in the population.
154
APPROPT
df
Sig. (2-tailed)
Mean
Difference
.456
72
.650
5.479E-02
.2942
Between Groups
Within Groups
Total
Sum of
Squares
3.093
72.688
75.781
df
1
71
72
Mean Square
3.093
1.024
F
3.021
Sig.
.087
In the descriptive data for both groups, it is found that in the the respondents in the
Islamic background institution perceive the conventional accounting different from
the perception of respondents from the conventional background institution. Overall,
the mean of this variable for the Islamic background group is 3.3400. Since the
critical mean is 3.0000, we could say that they have perceived that the conventional
accounting is inappropriate for the Muslim users. However, the mean for the
conventional background institution is 2.9063. Since the obtained mean is lower than
the critical mean, we could say that overall, the respondents from the conventional
background institutions have perceived that the conventional accounting is
appropriate for the need of Muslim users.
155
N
Islamic background
institution
Conventional
background institution
Total
Mean
Std. Deviation
Std. Error
Minimum
Maximum
25
3.3400
.9760
.1952
2.9371
3.7429
1.50
5.00
48
2.9063
1.0296
.1486
2.6073
3.2052
1.00
5.00
73
3.0548
1.0259
.1201
2.8154
3.2942
1.00
5.00
Conclusion
In this research, an empirical test on a group of Muslim accounting
academicians (MAA) in Yogyakarta province has been conducted. A number of
hypotheses are tested to reveal the appropriateness of conventional accounting for
Muslim business organizations in different background of higher education
institutions. Based on the test result we can say that there is a weak consensus among
the MAAs in Yogyakarta on the appropriateness of the conventional accounting to
provide appropriate information for the Muslim users. This weak consensus can be
understood as there is a different perception between Islamic background institutions
and conventional background institutions. The MAAs in Islamic background
institutions perceive significantly that the conventional accounting is inappropriate for
the Muslim users. Meanwhile the MAAs in the conventional background institutions
have perceived significantly that the conventional accounting is appropriate for the
need of Muslim users. This finding shows that the secular education has been
successfully internalized in the conventional background of institution that the
conventional accounting is value free and can be used in any society including
Muslim society.
On a deeper analysis on whether the efforts of an educational institution in
promoting Islamic values are related the perception towards conventional accounting,
it was found that there is a negative relationship between the efforts of an institution
in promoting Islamic values with the perception of accounting academicians on
conventional accounting. In other words the more efforts in promoting Islamic values,
the more conventional accounting is perceived inappropriate for the needs of Muslim
users. This means that the contradictive view on the Islamic principles in the ones
mind with the perceptions of accepting the suitability of conventional accounting in
achieving Islamic objectives of Muslim business organizations, can actually be
eliminated by providing more efforts in promoting Islamic values in the institutions
where one works.
References
Al-Quran, Original Arabic Text with English Translation & Selected Commentaries
by Abdullah Yusuf Ali. Kualalumpur: Saba Islamic Media.
Abdelgader, A.E. (1994), Accounting postulates and principles from an Islamic
perspective. Review of Islamic Economics, vol. 3, No. 2, pp1-18.
156
157
Khan, M.A. (1994), Accounting issues and concepts for Islamic Banking. in.
Development of an accounting system for Islamic Banking. The Institute of
Islamic Banking & Insurance, London.
Kinnear, P.R. & Gray, C.D. (1995), SPSS/PC+ Made Simple, LEA Publishers,
London.
Naqvi, S.N.H. (1981), Ethics and Economics: An Islamic Synthesis. The Islamic
Foundation, Leicester, UK.
Siddiqi, M.N. (1979), The Economic Enterprise in Islam. Islamic Publications Ltd,
Lahore.
Sombart, W. (1919), Der Moderne Kapitalismus. Dunker and Hurnblot, Munich.
Universitas Ahmad Dahlan, (2000), University Academic Handbook 2000-2001,
Universitas Ahmad Dahlan, Yogyakarta.
Universitas Cokroaminoto, (2000), Faculty of Economics Handbook, Universitas
Cokroaminoto, Yogyakarta..
Universitas Islam Indonesia, (2001), Faculty of Economics Handbook 2001-2002.
Universitas Islam Indonesia, Yogyakarta.
Universitas Muhammadiyah Yogyakarta, (2001), Faculty of Economics Handbook
2001-2002. Universitas Muhammadiyah Yogyakarta, Yogyakarta.
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Name of Institution
Universitas Muhammadiyah
Yogyakarta
Universitas Cokroaminoto
Yogyakarta
STIE SBI
Total Credit
Hours
11
10
10
6
4
10
Sources : Data is collected from the handbooks of the particular higher education
institutions and the interviews conducted with the Heads Department of
Accounting of the particular institutions.
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