Democracy in the Bullring: The Emergence and Representation of Postmaterial Conflicts in the Andes

• Author: Alberto Vergara,Viviana Baraybar
• Date: 01 September 2020
• DOI: 10.1177/0094582X20933624
• Published date: 01 September 2020
• Subject Matter: Articles

https://doi.org/10.1177/0094582X20933624

LATIN AMERICAN PERSPECTIVES, Issue 234, Vol. 47 No. 5, September 2020, 131–147

DOI: 10.1177/0094582X20933624

© 2020 Latin American Perspectives

131

Democracy in the Bullring

The Emergence and Representation of Postmaterial Conflicts

in the Andes

by

Alberto Vergara and Viviana Baraybar

Comparative analysis of the antibullfighting agenda in Bogotá, Lima, and Quito sheds

light on the relation between new social movements and left parties. It suggests that,

although a social movement is important to the visibility of the agenda, the key variable in

achieving a ban on bullfighting in the three capitals has been a decisive left leadership that

is not shy about confrontation with traditional elites.

Un análisis comparativo de la agenda contra la tauromaquia en Bogotá, Lima y Quito

devela la relación entre los nuevos movimientos sociales y los partidos de izquierda.

Sugiere que, aunque la existencia de un movimiento social resulta importante para visibi-

lizar dicha agenda, la variable clave para lograr la prohibición de la tauromaquia en las

tres capitales ha sido un liderazgo decisivo por parte de la izquierda, que no se ha mostrado

tímida cuando se trata de confrontar a las élites tradicionales.

Keywords: Representation, Postmaterial values, Bullfighting, Left leadership, Social

movements

On January 22, 2017, at least 1,000 people surrounded the bullring of Bogotá

to prevent the traditional bullfight festivities. The police had to intervene

between protesters and spectators, and the day ended with 30 injured and 18

arrested. The confrontation was so intense because of a ban on bullfighting

during Mayor Gustavo Petro’s administration (2011–2015) that was later ruled

unconstitutional. Petro’s successor, Enrique Peñaloza (2016–), had upheld the

decision and arranged for the return of bullfighting. Petro, about to be the 2018

presidential candidate at the time, headed the movement against bullfighting’s

return. Given the intense press coverage, this high-profile conflict forced most

Colombian political figures to take sides. The debate over bullfighting polar-

ized the country’s most important institutions and politicians, the press, and

public opinion, and Petro reached the second round of the Colombian presi-

dential election a year later.

Alberto Vergara is a professor in the Department of Political and Social Science at the Universidad

del Pacífico in Lima, Peru. His latest book, coedited with Hillel Soifer, is Politics after Violence:

Legacies of the Shining Path Conflict in Peru. Viviana Baraybar is a MPhil. Candidate in the

Department of Politics and International Relations of the University of Oxford. She is a member

of Nuffield College and a Clarendon Scholar. They thank Eduardo Dargent, Paula Muñoz, Omar

Manky and three anonymous reviewers for their comments on previous versions of this article

and Paulette Chamorro, who conducted the interviews in Quito.

933624LAPXXX10.1177/0094582X20933624Latin American PerspectivesVergara and Baraybar / POSTMATERIAL CONFLICTS IN THE ANDES

research-article2020

132 LATIN AMERICAN PERSPECTIVES

Postmaterial conflicts like this one are increasingly relevant in Latin American

politics. Abortion and reproductive rights, same-sex marriage, the environ-

ment, and gender equality have emerged as highly polarizing issues (Molyneux,

2002; Siegel, 2016). Animal rights—particularly opposition to bullfighting—is

another such issue and one that has remained unexplored in the political

science literature. The emergence of these new social movements relates both

to challenges to societies’ values and to the way traditional political vehicles

can represent them.

In this article we dig into these relations by examining the antibullfighting

agenda in three Andean capitals: Bogotá, Lima, and Quito. Empirically, we

analyze the main drivers of success or failure of the animal-rights agenda. Our

cases are well suited to the task in that the three capitals we compare present

distinct outcomes regarding the current legal situation of bullfighting: (1) Quito

banned the killing of bulls during fights, and this resulted in no fights’ taking

place since 2012; (2) after four years of prohibition, Bogotá reinstated bullfight-

ing in 2017; and (3) in Lima the efforts of activists have not translated into any

limits on bullfighting.1 The explanation of these outcomes relies on a theoretical

framework that articulates the relation between postmaterial values, social

movements, and representative politics in contemporary Latin America. Our

comparative assessment suggests that, rather than social movements’ being the

main driver of success, the prevailing type of representative left can be decisive

for the advance of this agenda.

We compare the three cases in terms of the following dimensions: (1) the

emergence of values against animal abuse and bullfighting, (2) the relevance of

animal-rights social movements, and (3) the type of left representation that has

carried the antibullfighting agenda. Our analysis shows that antibullfighting

social movements succeed when they march with a left leader who does not

hesitate to confront traditional elites. In Colombia and Ecuador the social

movements were fortunate to have Gustavo Petro and Rafael Correa, two

prominent national, populist, and polarizing figures, on their side. A “moder-

ate” left is, by definition, uninterested in confronting elites, and therefore the

agenda lacks political muscle and the social movements do not have much

room to push the agenda beyond giving it some visibility.

The article draws on 20 interviews with key actors in Bogotá, Quito, and

Lima and is structured as follows: First it frames the theoretical debate relating

postmaterial issues, social movements, and political representation. Then it

lays out the conflict over bullfighting in general and in our three cases. It con-

cludes by explaining the differences and similarities between the outcomes and

discussing their implications for an understanding of the relation between con-

temporary new social movements and the representative left.

Postmaterial Values, social moVements,

and rePresentation

The nature of the relation between postmaterial attitudes, social movements

embodying them, and the institutional politics representing them has a long

history. A classic instance of an issue combining these dimensions was the