FOR BETTER AND FOR WORSE: THE CRUCIAL RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN SUPPLIERS AND USERS OF WATER SERVICES WITHIN AN ITALIAN INDUSTRIAL DISTRICT.

Adopting a strategic perspective, the paper is aimed at highlighting the role played by water utilities companies when they become fundamental industrial partners for firms operating in traditional industrial districts and, in a broader way, in global value chains. To do this, we analyse the evolution of an Italian leather industrial district in the North East of the country, shedding light on the role played by water utilities companies settled in it. More in detail, after having deepen by a production point of view the fundamental partnership among industrial firms (leather firms) and water utilities companies, we figure out how under certain conditions, water utilities companies could act as distorting elements of competitive dynamics and, even, as structural limit to the economic growth of the district and, more in general, to the whole economic system of the territory.