Drivers, Barriers, and Outcomes of Green Practice Adoption and Management in Higher Education Institutions: A Systematic Review and Framework for Sustainable Campuses

Abstract Higher education institutions (HEIs) are increasingly adopting green practices to reduce environmental impacts, improve resource efficiency and strengthen institutional sustainability. However, prior research remains fragmented regarding the conditions that facilitate or constrain adoption, the progression of practices from initial adoption to institutionalized routines, and the outcomes associated with their implementation. This systematic literature review (SLR) synthesizes evidence on the Drivers, Barriers, Adoption/Implementation and Outcomes of green practices in HEIs and develops a Drivers–Barriers–Adoption/Implementation–Outcomes (DBAO) framework for sustainable-campus transformation. The review was structured according to the Scientific Procedures and Rationales for Systematic Literature Reviews (SPAR-4-SLR) protocol and reported in accordance with the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) 2020 framework. Two complementary Scopus searches were conducted on 22 July 2026 for studies published between 2006 and 2026. Following deduplication, 254 unique records were screened, 153 full-text articles were assessed and 40 studies were included in the final qualitative synthesis. The evidence identifies stakeholder participation, resources, leadership, institutional and policy support, knowledge and behavioural conditions as recurrent Drivers, while financial constraints, fragmented governance, limited knowledge and communication, resistance to change and infrastructure-related limitations emerge as important Barriers. Adoption is conceptualized as a multi-stage process involving initial adoption, operational implementation, organizational integration and institutionalization. Reported Outcomes span environmental and resource, economic and operational, social and behavioural, and institutional domains; however, the evidence comprises observed, perceptual and modelled outcomes and should therefore not be interpreted uniformly as realized causal effects. DBAO is consequently proposed as an evidence-informed, stage-ordered explanatory framework with a primary forward pathway and a theoretically proposed recursive feedback mechanism. The framework integrates antecedent conditions, implementation depth and multidimensional Outcomes and provides a foundation for longitudinal, comparative and multi-institutional empirical testing.