Author Details

About the author

Dr. Mohammad Omar Farooq is a distinguished academic, researcher, and author with over three decades of experience across the United States, the Middle East, and South Asia. He is Professor and Head of the Department of Economics at United International University (UIU), Bangladesh, and Founding Director of its Institute of Islamic Banking, Finance, and Economics (IIBFE). He also serves as an Independent Director on the Boards of United Power Generation & Distribution Company Limited and United Finance PLC.

Dr. Farooq earned his Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, specializing in development economics, the history of economic thought, and financial institutions, and held a Ciriacy-Wantrup Postdoctoral Fellowship in Natural Resource Economics at the University of California, Berkeley. He has taught at several U.S. universities for nearly 20 years and spent 15 years in Bahrain in academic leadership, including as Head of the Centre for Islamic Finance at the Bahrain Institute of Banking and Finance (BIBF).

His research and teaching cover economic development, financial markets and institutions, fintech, technical analysis, and Islamic economics, finance, and banking, alongside cross-cutting themes such as gender economics, human development, and genocide studies. He has authored numerous publications, serves on editorial boards, and is recognized for methodological pluralism and a strong emphasis on ethics and public interest.

Dr. Farooq’s scholarship bridges academic and public discourse, promoting value-oriented Islamic thought, as exemplified in his influential book Toward Our Reformation (IIIT, 2011), translated into more than ten languages. He is also a keen promoter of critical and creative thinking as part of mind-building, particularly among youth.