The capitalist realism of the 2020 Tokyo Olympic games

Yoshifusa Ichii

Contemporary Japan, 2023, vol. 35, issue 1, 58-72

Abstract: This article explores how the International Olympic Committee (IOC) prioritised the hosting of the Olympic Games during the COVID-19 pandemic. Without doubt, the prioritisation of hosting the Olympic Games during the pandemic here substantiates what literary critic Mark Fisher has called 'capitalist realism'. This concept refers to a worldview that holds that there is no other way than capitalism for the society in which we live. I argue that the Olympic Games are a symbol of capitalist realism. To make this argument, I first summarize Fisher’s concept of capitalist realism and Jules Boykoff’s (2020) arguments that the Olympic Industry is first and foremost about perpetuating capitalism in the form of ‘celebration capitalism’. Following this, I describe how a 'new lifestyle’ or ‘new normal' has been imposed by the state and used to create a setting for holding the postponed Olympics in its entirely 'perfect form'. Next, I discuss the role of neoliberalism in facilitating a paradoxical relationship between the state and private industry. Building from this, I suggest that the relationship between new ways of life, celebration capitalism and neoliberalism is a constitutive part of capitalist realism aimed at ensuring the rule of capital at any cost, as demonstrated by the IOC's running of the Olympics despite the COVID-19 epidemic. At the same time, the running the Games also empowered the Japanese government to create a state of exception that enables them to pursue economic and political goals with unprecedented freedom by simultaneously circumscribing the freedom of its citizens.

Date: 2023
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DOI: 10.1080/18692729.2023.2171717

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