From humble beginnings wholesaling at a small tobacconist-hairdresser shop in 1915, the London Rubber Company rapidly became the UK's biggest postwar producer and exporter of disposable rubber condoms. A first-mover and innovator, the company's continuous product development and strong brands (including Durex) allowed it to dominate supply to the retail trade and family planning clinics, leading it to intercede in the burgeoning women's market. 

When oral contraceptives came along, however, the company was caught in a bind between defending condoms against the pill and claiming a segment of the new birth control market for itself. In this first major study on the company, Jessica Borge shows how, despite the "unmentionable" status of condoms that inhibited advertising in the early twentieth century, aggressive business practices were successfully deployed to protect the monopoly and squash competition. Through close, evidence-based examination of LRC's first fifty years, encompassing its most challenging decades, the 1950s and 1960s, as well as an overview of later years including the AIDS crisis, Borge argues that the story of the modern disposable condom in Britain is really the story of the London Rubber Company, the circumstances that befell it, the struggles that beset it, the causes that opposed it, and the opportunities it created for itself. 
 
LRC's historic intervention in and contribution to female contraceptive practices sits uneasily with existing narratives centered on women's control of reproduction, but the time has come, Borge argues, for the condom to find its way back to the center of these debates. Protective Practices thereby re-examines a key transitional moment in social and cultural history through the lens of this unusual case study. 

Dr. Jessica Borge is a research associate , at Archives and Research Collections, King's College, London and a  researcher in the private sector.

Protective Practices: A History of the Condom Business with Jessica Borge

খাদ্যই জীবন, স্বাস্থ্য ও আশা।
সকলের খাদ্যের অধিকার থাকা উচিত।
তবে তা যেকোনো খাবার নয়।
প্রত্যেকেরই পুষ্টিকর, সাশ্রয়ী, নিরাপদ ও টেকসই খাবারের সুযোগ থাকা উচিত।
এবারের বিশ্ব খাদ্য দিবসে আমাদের সাথে যোগ দিন।
উন্নত জীবন ও উন্নত ভবিষ্যতের জন্য খাদ্যের অধিকারকে সমর্থন করুন।
ভিজিট করুন www.fao.org

বিশ্ব খাদ্য দিবস ২০২৪ - জনসেবা ঘোষণা

The Sports Zoo 09 - 24 - 24

Even before last month’s <a href="https://www.economist.com/asia/2024/09/19/the-taliban-is-removing-every-shred-of-freedom-from-women?utm_campaign=a.io&utm_medium=audio.podcast.np&utm_source=theintelligence&utm_content=discovery.content.anonymous.tr_shownotes_na-na_article&utm_term=sa.listeners" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">revised religious rules</a>, Afghanistan’s women were being crushed under the Taliban’s thumb. Now they cannot even so much as raise their voices. While other countries try to crimp the flow of cheap Chinese electric cars, Britain is <a href="https://www.economist.com/britain/2024/08/27/britains-unusual-stance-on-chinese-electric-vehicles?utm_campaign=a.io&utm_medium=audio.podcast.np&utm_source=theintelligence&utm_content=discovery.content.anonymous.tr_shownotes_na-na_article&utm_term=sa.listeners" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">welcoming them</a>—for now (9:55). And why the French have at last <a href="https://www.economist.com/culture/2024/09/10/why-many-french-have-come-to-like-emily-in-paris?utm_campaign=a.io&utm_medium=audio.podcast.np&utm_source=theintelligence&utm_content=discovery.content.anonymous.tr_shownotes_na-na_article&utm_term=sa.listeners" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">come to appreciate</a> “Emily in Paris” (16:12).&nbsp; Get a world of insights by <a href="https://subscribenow.economist.com/podcasts-plus" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">subscribing to Economist Podcasts+</a>. For more information about how to access Economist Podcasts+, please visit our <a href="https://myaccount.economist.com/s/article/What-is-Economist-Podcasts" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">FAQs page</a> or watch <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gczo71bg1uY" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">our video</a> explaining how to link your account. <hr> Hosted on Acast. See <a style='color:grey;' target='_blank' rel='noopener noreferrer' href='https://acast.com/privacy'>acast.com/privacy</a> for more information.

No right left: Afghanistan’s oppressed women

With all the instability within the Middle East and North Africa region of late, Egypt has nonetheless managed to reign in soaring inflation and win its largest-ever foreign investment. Egypt’s efforts to restore macroeconomic stability in recent years have led to an arrangement under the IMF’s Extended Fund Facility for Egypt, which makes available US$820 million to help support its reform agenda. Ivanna Vladkova Hollar leads the IMF’s work in Egypt. In this podcast, she says that while stabilizing its economy is positive, Egypt’s next big step is an economic transformation that will lift its private sector. 

Transcript: https://bit.ly/4efXuzH 

Learn more about the IMF’s work in Egypt at IMF.org/Egypt

Egypt: Stability Lays Groundwork for Transformation

L is for Lamb

His Costume Was Awesome

The Fist is My Right

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Protective Practices: A History of the Condom Business with Jessica Borge

Hagley Museum and Library

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