Johan Fischer

Roskilde University · Department of Social Sciences and Business (ISE)

A hypermarket is a combined supermarket and department store that carries a large range of products. Since the opening of the first hypermarket in the US in the early 1930s, this concept has spread globally. Nowhere is this trend more visible than in India, now the world's most populous country with a middle class that will expectedly grow to 800 m...

Never before in human history have vegetarianism and a plant-based economy been so closely associated with sustainability and the promise of tackling climate change. Nowhere is this phenomenon more visible than in India, which is home to the largest number of vegetarians globally and where vegetarianism is intrinsic to Hinduism. India is often cons...

The increasing visibility of halal (meat) products in non-Muslim countries, such as Denmark, highlights the central and controversial role of Muslim authority in the regulation/certification of halal products along two axes: Muslims/non-Muslims and divergent Muslim groups/organisations. Using qualitative data gathered through participant observatio...

This paper explores three moral economies that regulate the production and circulation of things and economic transactions: kosher (a Hebrew term meaning ‘fit’ or ‘proper’), halal (an Arabic word that literally means ‘permissible’ or ‘lawful’), and Hindu vegetarianism. Over the last three decades, these moral economies have been shaped by new forms...

This chapter explores epistemological approaches to over two decades of research on the role of Muslim Southeast Asia in global religious markets. Methodologically, I discuss two interlinked approaches to studying Muslim markets and halal (literally ‘permissible’ or ‘lawful’) commodities and services in Malaysia in particular: globalisation and net...

This issue of Perspectives explores why and how landscapes of production, trade, regulation, and consumption are transformed in contemporary South Asia. It does so by exploring a specific relationship or tension: that of bazaar economies and standardised economies. Conventionally, bazaars or bazaar economies of South Asia and elsewhere are associat...

This book explores the emergence and expansion of global kosher and halal markets with a particular focus on the UK and Denmark. Kosher is a Hebrew term meaning 'fit' or 'proper' while halal is an Arabic word that literally means 'permissible' or 'lawful'. This is the first book to explore kosher and halal comparatively at different levels of the s...

In 2011, the Indian state made it mandatory to label all packaged food products to indicate whether they are vegetarian (green/veg) or non-vegetarian (brown/non-veg). Given the rise of a consumer culture relying on super/hypermarkets, these labels are now ubiquitous on packaging throughout India. While the concept of ahimsa (non-injury to all livin...

The Hebrew term kosher means ‘fit’ or ‘proper’ and it traditionally signifies foods that conform to Jewish dietary law (kashrut). This article explores how kosher is understood, practised and contested in contemporary Denmark. In recent years, the rules regulating kosher consumption have been supplemented by elaborate rules concerning globalised ma...

The first volume to explore Muslim piety as a form of economy, this book examines specific forms of production, trade, regulation, consumption, entrepreneurship and science that condition – and are themselves conditioned by – Islamic values, logics and politics. With a focus on Southeast Asia as a site of significant and diverse integration of Isla...

This paper reviews the literature on vegetarianism (veg) and meat-eating (non-veg) in India. My central aim is to explore how vegetarianism and meat-eating are addressed in existing research in order to identify gaps and pave the way for a new research agenda on the complex and changing relationship between vegetarianism and meat-eating at differen...

The Hebrew term ‘kosher’ means ‘fit’ or ‘proper’ and signifies foods conforming to Jewish dietary law (kashrut). Kosher biotechnical production is subject to elaborate rules that have warranted regulation over the last two decades. This article shows how kosher regulation works in biotech production. I argue that while existing studies of kosher pr...

Kosher is a Hebrew term meaning ‘fit’ or ‘proper’ and halal is an Arabic word that literally means ‘permissible’ or ‘lawful’. Within the last two decades or so, kosher and halal markets have become global in scope and states, manufacturers, restaurants, shops, certifiers and consumers around the world are faced with ever stricter and more complex r...

Within the last couple of decades, new types of religious logos have emerged. Notably, halal (in Arabic, halal literally means “permissible” or “lawful”) logos are increasingly appearing on products, certificates, websites as well as in restaurants, shops, and advertisements globally. However, little empirical attention has been paid to these relig...

This article explores Malaysia’s bid to become the world leader in rapidly expanding halal (literally, “lawful” or “permitted”) markets on a global scale through the embedding of a particular global Islamic imagination. The Malaysian state has become central to the certification, standardization, and bureaucratiza-tion of Malaysian halal production...

In this chapter we explore how Jewish consumers in the UK and Denmark understand and practice kosher consumption in their everyday lives. Many Jewish groups are fastidious about their everyday kosher consumption and this point has reinforced regulation of global kosher production and regulation. A specific focus in this chapter is how consumers mak...

This chapter serves as an introduction to Judaism/kosher and Islam/halal in the UK and Denmark respectively. The main function of these discussions is to give the reader a broader historical and societal context for exploring kosher and halal in greater empirical detail in subsequent chapters; we also discuss broader similarities and differences be...

In focusing on the consequences of globalising kosher and halal markets this book has demonstrated that similarities and differences between kosher and halal consumption, production and regulation in different national contexts are not well understood, and that to better understand global kosher and halal markets they must be explored at different...

Within the last couple of decades, the trend in both kosher and halal production is that these globalising religious markets have moved beyond meat to include enzyme production, for example, as enzymes are part of a wide range of types of foods and drinks. This chapter explores how multinational companies that are both kosher and halal certified un...

This chapter explores the manufacture and production of kosher and halal meat (both red meat and poultry) in London and Manchester in the UK and also Denmark with specific reference to audits/inspections, legislation, networking, product innovation and certification. The reason for focusing on the UK in particular is, firstly, the UK has large Jewi...

In this chapter we explore how Muslim consumers in the UK and Denmark understand and practice halal consumption in their everyday lives. The specific focus is how consumers make sense of buying/eating meat and non-meat products. Another important theme explored is how Muslim consumers understand and practice everyday (halal) food consumption in the...

In the first decades of the 21st century, kosher and halal markets have become global in scope and states, manufacturers, restaurants, shops and consumers around the world have been presented with ever stricter and more complex kosher and halal requirements. Religion, regulation, consumption: Globalising kosher and halal markets explores the emerge...

This is the introductory chapter to:

Purpose The purpose of this empirical research is to explore the relationship between Halal food certification and business performance. This study argues that Halal food certificate implementation positively influences business performance. Design/methodology/approach A total of 210 Halal certified food manufacturing companies in Malaysia partici...

The purpose of this article is to further our understanding of the transformation of Muslim consumption and anti-consumption by an empirical case study of Malaysia. Much current anti-consumerist and anti-globalization discourse identifies boycotting as an immensely powerful force. I argue that insufficient attention has been paid to the micro-socia...

In Arabic, halal literally means “permissible” or “lawful”. This chapter explores how Islamic science conditions and is conditioned by halal in Malaysia and some broader tendencies this reflects. Even if halal is no longer an expression of esoteric forms of production, trade, and consumption but part of a huge and expanding globalized market, the s...

Within the last two decades or so there has been increased scholarly focus on the emergence, consolidation and future of the middle class in developing Asia. This is also the case with the Malay Muslim middle class in Malaysia, but how this class is developing over time is not well understood even if the Malays constitute the largest and fastest gr...

In this empirically rich collection of essays, a team of leading international scholars explore the way that economic transformation is sustained and challenged by everyday practices across Southeast Asia. Drawing together a body of interdisciplinary scholarship, the authors explore how the emergence of more marketized forms of economic policy-maki...

Most recent scholarship on moral economies or religious markets argues for the compatibility of economies/markets and religious practices in particular national or regional contexts. However, over the last couple of decades or so religious markets have entered a new phase characterized by new forms of regulation, certification and standardization o...

In today’s globalized world, halal (meaning ‘permissible’ or ‘lawful’) is about more than food. Politics, power and ethics all play a role in the halal industry in setting new standards for production, trade, consumption and regulation. The question of how modern halal markets are constituted is increasingly important and complex. Written from a un...

Halal (literally, “permissible” or “lawful”) production, trade, and standards have become essential to state-regulated Islam and to companies in contemporary Malaysia and Singapore, giving these two countries a special position in the rapidly expanding global market for halal products: In these nations state bodies certify halal products as well as...

In today’s globalized world, halal (meaning ‘permissible’ or ‘lawful’) is about more than food. Politics, power and ethics all play a role in the halal industry in setting new standards for production, trade, consumption and regulation. The question of how modern halal markets are constituted is increasingly important and complex. Written from a un...

In 2010, as part of a research project, I accompanied the Orthodox Union's (OU) Senior European rabbinic field representative and Novozymes' Global Halal and Kosher Coordinator on the annual kosher inspection at Novozymes' production facility for enzymes in Denmark. You might find it surprising that a biotech company with an annual revenue of aroun...

In Arabic, halal literally means ‘permissible’ or ‘lawful’. Halal is no longer an expression of an esoteric form of production, trade and consumption, but part of a huge and expanding globalized market in which certification, standards and technoscience play important roles. Over the past three decades, Malaysia has become a world leader in the glo...

In a modern and respectable middle-class suburb outside Kuala Lumpur, the overtness of cars evokes intense speculation about the nature of the make-up of covert middle-class homes and the formation of Malay Muslim identities more generally. I argue that the more ‘Islamic’ cultures of consumption assert themselves in modern Malaysia, the more the gr...

This paper explores Malaysia’s efforts to develop and dominate a global market in halal (literally, ‘lawful or ‘permitted’) commodities as a diaspora strategy and how Malaysian state institutions, entrepreneurs, restaurants and middle-class groups in London respond to and are affected by this effort. The empirical focus is on London because this ci...

In the rapidly expanding global market for halal products, Malaysia and Singapore hold a special position as the only two countries in the world where state bodies certify halal products, spaces (shops, factories and restaurants) as well as work processes. In these two countries and in shops all around the world, consumers can find state halal‐cert...

Five overarching themes have permeated discussions throughout this book: the politics of the national, diasporic identity, and ethnicity; economics in relation to Islam and Malaysia’s role in the global market for religious/ethnic commodities; science as a privileged domain highlighting the role of Islam in contemporary, secular settings; authority...

Outside Southeast Asia, London is emerging as a center for halal production, trade, and consumption. At the same time, the meaning and practices of halal are being transformed and contested. Paradoxically, in the eyes of many Muslims in Britain, this proliferation of halal calls attention to a form of impotent secular government, that is, in the ey...

In a study of the potential halal market in the United Kingdom, the Malaysia External Trade Development Corporation (MATRADE) writes that the labeling of halal products is “of course crucial for its acceptance by the UK Muslim population” (http:// edms. matrade. gov. my/domdoc/Reports.nsf/svReport/86763F1A9777C47A482571010012E74B/$File/PMS-%20Halal...

This chapter is an exploration of the spaces or landscapes in which middle-class Malays in London consume halal. Halal and halal certification, discussed in the previous chapter, have much to do with the context in which halal is displayed and sold: it is not just a matter of “halalness” as an intrinsic quality that complies with a particular relig...

In this chapter, I discuss the way in which Islam has been nationalized and halal has been standardized in Malaysia. This has taken place through Malaysia’s bold halal vision. I will provide a glimpse into Malaysia International Halal Showcase (MIHAS), social and physical mobility among the Malay middle class, food and middle-class practice, the et...

Halal is an Arabic word that literally means “permissible” or “lawful.” Conventionally, halal signifies “pure food” with regard to meat in particular by proper Islamic practice such as ritual slaughter and pork avoidance. In the modern world, halal is no longer an expression of esoteric forms of production, trade, and consumption but part of a huge...

This chapter deals with the sanitization of halal in the modern scientific world, that is, how Malays in London understand and practice halal (food) as part of modern discourses of meat/stunning, health/nutrition, food scares, science, heating/cooling binaries, and excess as well as kosher and vegetarian food. When informants evoke “science” below,...

This article examines the sanitisation of halal in the modern scientific world, that is, how Malays in London understand and practise halal as part of modern discourses of meat/stunning, health, nutrition, purity, food scares, science and excess. From being an Islamic injunction in the Koran and the Sunna, halal both evokes and is evoked by a whole...