Higher education institutions are vital stakeholders in advancing sustainable development in terms of being organisational role models and also advancing action based on their outputs. Given that higher education institutions conduct sustainability research and teach about sustainability, it could be assumed that The Higher Education Institution (HEI) can be used as a role model by other organisations for addressing major sustainability issues such as climate change. However, the implementation of sustainability in a university is often limited by many challenges at the institutional level, which are heavily influenced by the context of the country in which that institution is located. Thus, it is both necessary and timely to investigate these challenges, to develop strategies to facilitate the advancement of universities toward achieving the sustainable development goals (SDGs). Indonesia is committed to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and is taking significant action to mitigate against and adapt to climate change. The President of Indonesia has asked universities to play an active role in achieving the goals but very few universities have taken up such a role. Of the 4,000 universities in Indonesia (Kemendikbud, 2020), only 32 universities are included in the Times Higher Education 2022 Impact Rankings ranking radar. Despite the nation's commitment to sustainable development, there is an absence of an appropriate model for implementing Sustainable Development in Higher Education Institutions (SDHEI) in Indonesia that overcomes the challenges faced by Indonesia, especially those related to financial pressure. Thus, Indonesia needs examples of strategies and practices that can be adopted in the local context and this thesis aims to serve this purpose. This thesis examines the implementation of sustainability within Indonesian universities and how other global examples can be applied to the Indonesian context to advance SDHEI. The core finding of this study was that the application of the concept of sustainability at universities in Indonesia has not been adopted widely because of the following six key challenges faced by the universities in Indonesian universities: 1) the absence of sustainable policies for higher education institutions, 2) financial and budgeting issues, 3) asynchronous regulations and policies between vertical and horizontal institutions, 4) the lack of information and role models for establishing sustainable universities, 5) low level of literacy about sustainability, and 6) the lack of student involvement. [...]