THE CONCEPT OF PEACEFUL AND INCLUSIVE SOCIETIES UNDER THE 16TH SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT GOAL IN THE LIGHT OF THE SEERAH OF THE HOLY PROPHET MUHAMMAD (P.B.U.H.)

Abstract

Sustainable Development Goal 16 (SDG 16) commits the international community to building peaceful, just, and inclusive societies, yet its secular liberal idiom has struggled to secure durable legitimacy across the fifty-seven member states of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation. This article addresses that legitimacy gap by asking whether the Seerah of the Prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H.)—the authenticated historical record of his prophetic mission—provides an indigenous, theologically grounded framework for the values SDG 16 seeks to institutionalise. Drawing on Qur'anic exegesis, authenticated Hadith literature, and classical and contemporary Seerah scholarship, the article traces the prophetic model of peacebuilding through the Hilf al-Fudul, the Hijrah, the Constitution of Medina, the Treaty of Hudaybiyyah, the general amnesty at the conquest of Mecca, and the Farewell Sermon, and the prophetic model of inclusive governance through the shura tradition, the covenants extended to the Jewish tribes of Medina and the Christian community of Najran, the transformation of women's political, economic, and legal status, and the redistributive institutions of zakat, waqf, and hisbah. A target-by-target comparison against SDG 16's ten substantive targets finds strong convergence across the majority of the Goal's commitments—reduction of violence, access to justice, accountable institutions, participatory governance, and protection of fundamental freedoms—alongside genuine and unresolved divergences concerning the ultimate source of normative authority, the relationship between religious law and public governance, and the tension between formal equality and differentiated rights. The article argues that these convergences and divergences together position the prophetic model as a complement to, rather than a substitute for, SDG 16's universal framework, offering Muslim-majority states an authentically grounded vocabulary through which to pursue the Goal's objectives. It concludes with policy-relevant recommendations organised around the constitutional entrenchment of shura, the revival of hisbah-based regulatory accountability, and the institutionalisation of zakat and waqf as transparent instruments of economic inclusion.