Looking at the programme for the feria of San Isidro in Madrid this month (bullfights are being held on 31 consecutive days), it may be hard to believe that there is any threat to the future of the spectacle — it is not a sport — of what in Spain is called la corrida (the running of the bulls). But its popularity has undeniably been declining in recent years, due to two factors: growing opposition, in the sometimes spurious name of animal welfare, and Spain’s economic crisis.
The decision taken in 2010 to ban bullfighting in Catalonia had considerably less to do with the welfare of bulls than with the Catalans’ wish to distance themselves from the rest of Spain and Spanish traditions. The reaction from the Madrid government was to transfer responsibility for bullfighting from the Interior Ministry to the Ministry of Culture, formally giving to la fiesta nacional the status of patrimonio cultural.
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