The case follows the story of Brazilian business leader, Ricardo Semler, who took the family marine-pump business, Semco, to multi-national, multi-sector success. To do so, Ricardo Semler dramatically changed his own leadership style by relinquishing control and working less hard, and subsequently transformed the culture at Semco via a radical process of workplace democratisation.

The case is about the privatization of water in the Argentinean province of Tucumán, and its subsequent re-nationalization, which attracted major media and NGO coverage as epitomizing the drawbacks of public-utility privatization. It looks at the conflict between the Provincial Government of Tucumán and Aguas del Aconquija SA, the concessionaire.

Unilever is a solid leader in the Brazilian detergent powder market with an 81% market share.