The Running of the Bulls

Every July, in the Spanish city of Pamplona, something extraordinary and controversial happens. For nine mornings in a row, six fighting bulls are released into the narrow, cobbled streets of the old city, and hundreds of people — mostly young men — run in front of them, trying to stay just ahead of a tonne of angry animal. The run covers about 875 metres and usually lasts between two and six minutes. It is terrifying, dangerous, and watched by millions of people on television around the world.

The event is called the "encierro" in Spanish, and it is part of a much larger festival called the Fiesta de San Fermín. The festival honours the patron saint of Pamplona and has been held in some form since at least the 14th century. It includes parades, fireworks, music, dancing, and traditional religious ceremonies. But it is the bull run that has made Pamplona famous — and it is the bull run that divides opinion so sharply.

The tradition began for practical reasons. Centuries ago, bulls needed to be moved from the fields outside the city to the bullring in the centre, where bullfights took place in the afternoon. Young men began running ahead of the bulls to prove their bravery, and over time this practical necessity became a celebrated tradition.

Today, the Fiesta de San Fermín attracts more than a million visitors to a city of just 200,000 people. The bull run was made internationally famous by the American author Ernest Hemingway, who described it in his 1926 novel "The Sun Also Rises." Hemingway visited Pamplona nine times and is celebrated in the city with a statue and a street named after him.

The Running of the Bulls is genuinely dangerous. Since records began in 1910, 16 people have been killed during the run, and every year dozens of runners are injured — sometimes seriously. In the 2026 festival, which took place last week, 13 people were injured, including one runner who was pierced by a bull's horn in the face.

The run begins at 8 o'clock in the morning with a rocket fired into the sky. The bulls are released from a pen at one end of the route, and they charge through the narrow streets towards the bullring at the other end. Runners wear traditional white clothing with red scarves and belts. The streets are lined with wooden barriers that spectators can stand behind, and there are emergency gaps in the barriers that runners can dive through if a bull gets too close.

Despite the danger — or perhaps because of it — thousands of people apply to run every year. Many runners describe the experience as the most intense adrenaline rush of their lives. The combination of speed, fear, and the knowledge that a wrong step could be fatal creates a powerful emotional experience that runners say is impossible to replicate in any other way.

Critics point out that many of the runners are tourists who have been drinking heavily the night before and have no understanding of bull behaviour. Experienced runners follow strict informal rules — they run in a straight line, they never touch the bulls, and they never stop moving. But inexperienced runners often panic, fall, and create dangerous pile-ups that put everyone at risk. Local Pamplona runners have become increasingly frustrated with what they see as the reckless behaviour of tourists.

While the danger to human runners attracts the most media attention, it is the treatment of the bulls that generates the most passionate debate. Animal rights organisations have campaigned for decades to have the Running of the Bulls — and the bullfights that follow in the afternoon — banned.

The bulls used in the run are fighting bulls — a special breed raised specifically for bullfighting. After the morning run, the same bulls are used in the afternoon bullfight, where they are fought by professional matadors and ultimately killed. Animal rights groups argue that the entire process — the stress of being chased through crowded streets, the noise, the confusion, and the violent death in the bullring — causes enormous suffering to the animals.

Defenders of the tradition argue that fighting bulls live far better lives than most farm animals. They are raised on large open ranches, they eat high-quality food, they are never confined to small spaces, and they live for four to six years before they enter the ring — compared to most beef cattle, which are slaughtered at around 18 months. They argue that the few minutes in the ring should be weighed against years of freedom and good treatment.

The debate has intensified in recent years. Bullfighting has already been banned in some parts of Spain — the Canary Islands banned it in 1991, and Catalonia banned it in 2010 (though the ban was later overturned by Spain's Constitutional Court). Polls show that a majority of young Spaniards oppose bullfighting, while older generations tend to support it. The question of whether cultural traditions can justify practices that cause animal suffering is one that societies around the world are increasingly being forced to confront.

The debate about the Running of the Bulls is really a much bigger debate about the role of tradition in modern society. Every culture in the world has traditions that were created in a different time, under different values, and that sit uncomfortably with modern ideas about animal welfare, safety, or equality. The question is not unique to Spain — it is universal.

In Japan, whale hunting continues as a cultural tradition despite international opposition. In parts of Denmark and the Faroe Islands, pilot whales are driven into shallow water and killed in an annual hunt called the "grindadráp." In many countries, traditions involving animals — from horse racing to rodeos to dog shows — attract criticism from people who believe that using animals for human entertainment is wrong.

Those who defend traditions like the bull run often make a point that goes beyond the specific event. They argue that traditions connect us to our history, that they give communities a shared identity, and that losing them means losing something important about who we are. They warn that judging the past by the standards of the present leads to a world in which nothing old survives.

Those who oppose such traditions argue that the ability to change is itself a sign of progress. Traditions that once included human sacrifice, public executions, and the denial of rights to women and minorities have all been abandoned as societies evolved. The question is not whether traditions should change — they always do — but which ones deserve to survive and which ones society has outgrown.

For now, the bulls still run through the streets of Pamplona every July. Whether they will still be running in fifty years is a question that Spain — and the world — has not yet answered.