The last half decade has witnessed a remarkable resurgence of attention among practitioners and scholars to understanding the ability of corporate social responsibility to address environmental and social problems. While significant advances have been made, assessing the forms, types and impacts on intended objectives is impeded by the conflation of distinct phenomena, which has created misunderstandings about why firms support corporate social responsibility, and the implications of this support, or lack thereof, for the potential effectiveness of innovative policy options. As a corrective, we offer seven categories that distinguish efforts promoting learning and stakeholder engagement from those requiring direct on-the-ground behavior changes. Better accounting for these differences is critical for promoting a research agenda that focuses on the evolutionary nature of corporate social responsibility innovations including whether specific forms are likely to yield marginal or transformative results.