Institutionalisation of Shariah Governance Practices: Loosely Coupling as a Catalyst to Evolutionary Change

This study examines the institutionalisation of Shariah governance practices within Islamic financial institutions (IFIs), focusing on EMERALD an Islamic bank in Malaysia. Anchored in institutional theory and the processual framework of Burns and Scapens (2000), the study analyses how Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) regulatory, Shariah principle and institutional demands converge within a complex institutional setting. Empirical data were collected through nine in-depth interviews, extensive document analysis, and NVivo-assisted thematic interpretation. This study investigates EMERALD’s response to BNM’s Shariah Governance Policy Document (SGPD) 2019.