De la circularité traditionnelle à l’inclusion financière : un modèle intégratif fondé surles Boutiques des sciences et la finance solidaire islamique dans Noun

The Bamoum Kingdom, a culturally rich society in Cameroon, possesses a tangible and intangible heritage rooted in traditional circular practices spanning crafts, agriculture, pharmacopoeia, and architecture. Yet this informal circular economy remains weakly structured and insufficiently valued. This article examines how Science Shops can catalyze the transformation of these local forms of knowledge into drivers of sustainable development through co-constructed knowledge and their articulation with grassroots Islamic solidarity finance mechanisms.
Drawing on fieldwork conducted in Foumban (August–September 2024), the study employs a participatory approach combining ethnographic observations, semi-structured interviews with 32 actors, and co-design workshops. The findings reveal that Bamoum practices already embody sophisticated forms of circularity: 78% of artisans reuse construction materials, all blacksmiths incorporate at least 60% recycled metal, and 85% of textile scraps are repurposed. However, 95% of community actors remain excluded from the current Islamic banking offer in Cameroon, which reproduces the exclusion mechanisms of conventional finance despite its inclusive aims.
The interplay between scientific valorization of heritage knowledge (cognitive justice), participatory mediation (Science Shops), and Islamic solidarity finance thus produces an integrative model capable of transforming the Bamoum circular economy into a driver of sustainable territorial development. The theoretical contribution lies in demonstrating that financial inclusion in Africa cannot result from transplanting exogenous banking instruments but requires grounding in the socio-cultural and economic realities of territories. When Islamic finance is built from the bottom up rather than imposed from above, it regains its foundational vocation of social justice embedded in the Maqāṣid al-Sharīʿa.