This paper will provide an explanation for the recent rise of business-related organizations in Latin America that seek to promote corporate social responsibility in a period of sluggish economic growth. With a focus on Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Chile, Mexico, and Peru, the paper will describe a changing political economy context, in which the private sector has gained power and space relative to the public sector, as a background for the analysis of relevant variables. These will include a comparative assessment of the role of: social pressure from civil society organizations; changing views from within business elites, and the dissemination of new management concepts (such as stakeholdership). The paper will also identify and explain a major difference within this set of countries: Brazil stands out for the depth and breadth of, and relative success in the promotion of corporate social responsibility. While in the other countries the rise of these organizations may be viewed as a response to crises, in Brazil it must be viewed as the result of the social relations established by business elites as they turned to opposition to the military regime in the late 1970s and early 1980s. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]