Covering the 2020 Tokyo Olympics as the Recovery Olympics After Fukushima

Abstract

This article examines how major Japanese national newspapers - the Asahi Shimbun, the Mainichi Shimbun, the Yomiuri Shimbun, the Nihon Keizai Shimbun, and the Sankei Shimbun - discussed the 2020 Tokyo Olympics as the “Recovery Olympics” in relation to radioactive materials as a key post-Fukushima environmental contamination issue. Although many scholars have critically examined the concept of the Recovery Olympics in the context of the Great East Japan Earthquake, Tsunami, and Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster, this study employs Beck’s risk society and Boykoff’s celebration capitalism theories to distinguish between the recovery discourses of the earthquake and tsunami versus the Fukushima disaster. It then explores the media’s depiction of the Recovery Olympics in relation to radioactive contamination. Using Fairclough’s dialectical-relational approch to critical discourse analysis, this study demonstrates that the leading Japanese national newspapers localized the issue of post-Fukushima environmental contamination within Fukushima Prefecture, thereby obscuring broader impacts for the Olympics. Additionally, it uncovers how these newspapers emphasized safety standards, transforming post-Fukushima environmental contamination below such standards into a symbol legitimizing the Recovery Olympics.

Keywords

The 2020 Tokyo Olympics recovery Olympics Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster newspapers Japan

The 2020 Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics (the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, hereafter) were postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic and eventually took place from July 23rd to August 9th in 2021. Prior to the first-ever rescheduled Olympic games, the Japanese government declared a state of emergency in Tokyo from July 12th to August 22nd to contain the spread of the new coronavirus, which led to debates over whether hosting the Olympics during such a challenging time was socially appropriate (e.g., the Asahi Shimbun, 2021a).

However, what was less known was another state of emergency by the Japanese government, the state of nuclear emergency (e.g., Koide, 2020; Ogawa, 2021). It was declared immediately after the Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami of 2011, which occurred 10 years before the Olympics. At 14:46 (JST) on March 11th, 2011, an undersea megathrust earthquake and the resulting tsunami severely devastated the Tōhoku region in Japan. The combination of these natural disasters triggered the meltdown of three reactors within the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. Over the ensuing 2 weeks, the wrecked power plant released a tremendous amount of radioactive materials into the environment (e.g., NHK Meruto Daun Shuzai Han, 2021). At 16:36 (JST) on the same day, the Japanese government issued a state of nuclear emergency under the Act on Special Measures concerning Nuclear Emergency Preparedness in order to prevent the spread of the nuclear disaster. Under the declaration of a state of nuclear emergency, the Japanese government raised the public dose limit from 1 millisievert per year to 20 millisievert per year, allowing people, including children, to stay and live in areas where the dose limit does not exceed 20 millisievert per year.

Despite the ongoing state of nuclear emergency, then Prime Minister Shinzō Abe asserted in his successful pitch to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in September 2013 that the situation of Fukushima was under control, emphasizing in response to questions from IOC members that the Japanese state has completely controlled the radiation leakage from the Fukushima Daiichi power plant and that Tokyo is far enough away from Fukushima to be safe (e.g., Yoshimi, 2021). While his statement provoked controversy, the issue of the Fukushima disaster did not interfere with the bidding process (e.g., Boykoff, 2021).

Ultimately, the 2020 Tokyo Olympics proceeded in Tokyo under a double state of emergency, which included the COVID-19 pandemic and the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster (e.g., Ogawa, 2021). Although Tokyo is located 220 km away from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, it is important to note that as events and games of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics took place in areas outside of Tokyo, including Fukushima Prefecture, the significance of the state of the nuclear emergency during the Olympics should not have been underestimated. Nevertheless, many scholars focused exclusively on the Tokyo 2020 Olympics in relation to the former state of emergency, leaving aside the latter (e.g., Uesugi & Higashiyama, 2022). In response, this study sheds light upon the latter and pays critical attention to the link between the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and the consequences of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster.

To date, most scholars and critics of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics focused on the idea of the Fukkō Gorin or the Olympics of the Recovery from the triple disaster (e.g., Abe, 2020; Abe, 2023b; Ishizaka, 2021; McDonald, 2020; Sasao, 2022; Takamine, 2020; Ukai, 2020; Yoshimi, 2021). As many scholars pointed out (e.g., Ōbayashi, 2017; Yoshimi, 2021), it is crucial to understand the notion of the Recovery Olympics in its historical context, as the term has been historically loaded, with previous Olympics also being referred to as Olympics of the Recovery from various disasters (e.g., Yoshimi, 2020). For example, Abe (2020) pointed out that the Tokyo Organizing Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games officially referred to the canceled 1940 Tokyo Olympics as the Olympics of the Recovery from the 1923 Great Kantō Earthquake, the 1964 Tokyo Olympics as the Olympics of the Recovery from the war devastation, and the 2020 Tokyo Olympics as the Olympics of the Recovery from the triple disaster, respectively. Furthermore, Yoshimi (2020) has argued that the Recovery Olympics discourse was once used to marginalize the public memories of World War II when it was deployed for the first Tokyo Olympics of 1964. Therefore, scholars have emphasized the importance of understanding the historical and political implications of the Recovery Olympics discourse (e.g., Endō, 2017).

However, it is essential to recognize that there were significant differences between the 1964 Tokyo Olympics and the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, particularly in terms of what was being recovered from. The 1964 Olympics were seen as a symbol of recovery from war devastation, a human-made disaster. However, the 2020 Olympics as the Recovery Olympics required a much more complex recovery effort that involved both natural and human-made disasters (e.g., Horikawa, 2012; the National Diet of Japan Fukushima Nuclear Accident Independent Investigation Commission, 2012). It is thus crucial to drive a wedge between the two natural disasters and the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster by problematizing the fundamental assumption of the Recovery Olympics from the triple disaster as a single event.

Prior to the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, it was evident that the Fukushima disaster remained a contentious issue, as underscored by several controversies documented in the literature (Abe, 2023b; Aoki, 2021; Boykoff, 2021; Imai & Asahi Shimbum Fukushima Sōkyoku, 2021). One reason for this is that cesium 137, a radioactive isotope released during the disaster, has a lengthy half-life of approximately 30 years, which presents a challenge in terms of establishing the disaster’s timeline and recovery (e.g., Abe, 2023a). Therefore, it is worth noting that numerous citizens regarded the remaining radioactive materials as environmental contamination and took it upon themselves to measure soil contamination and estimate the levels of soil contamination in July 2020 (the month in which the opening ceremony of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics was initially planned) (e.g., Abe, 2023b; Mina-no Data Site, 2019). This environmental justice practice gained significant attention in East Asia and specifically resulted in a controversy over post-Fukushima environmental contamination between Japan and South Korea before the 2020 Tokyo Olympics (e.g., Nakamura, 2019; the Sankei Shimbun, 2019). Consequently, it is critical to explore the specific objectives of the Recovery Olympics in terms of recovering from the human-made environmental disaster.

Expanding on these observations, this research conducts a critical examination of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics as the Recovery Olympics, with a particular focus on radioactive materials as a central aspect of post-Fukushima environmental contamination. In this process, this article will not only scrutinize how existing yet imperceptible environmental contamination was framed and contextualized in relation to the Olympics but also elucidate how the emergent environmental discourses contributed to the Recovery Olympics discourse. By doing so, this study presents a distinctive case that advances our comprehension of sport communication, as will be demonstrated.

Inspired by Yoon and Wilson (2018), this article focuses on the role of mass media and investigates how major Japanese national newspapers created media discourse about the 2020 Tokyo Olympics as the Recovery Olympics in relation to radioactive materials as a key post-Fukushima environmental contamination issue. Although it is ideal to examine the entire coverage of Japanese mass media, focusing on major national newspapers nonetheless offers significant advantages for this study. Since these five major national newspapers have maintained informational and financial connections to Japanese national broadcasting agencies (e,g, Freeman, 2000; Fujitake & Takeshita, 2018), an examination of Japanese newspapers will not only provide insights into some of the Japanese mass media’s perspectives on the 2020 Tokyo Olympics as the Recovery Olympics but also enable a systematic exploration of the relations between the two terms: the Recovery Olympics and radioactive materials.

In contrast to numerous studies that critically discussed Western media coverage of the Olympics in relation to environmental issues (e.g, Boykoff, 2014; Lenskyj, 1998), this article will concentrate on major Japanese newspapers as the case of East Asian media in relation to the post-Fukushima environmental issue. Of notable significance, major Japanese newspapers—including the Asahi Shimbun, the Mainichi Shimbun, the Yomiuri Shimbun, the Nihon Keizai Shimbun (the Nikkei), and the Sankei Shimbun—served as sponsors for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. While the Asahi, the Mainichi, the Yomiuri, and the Nikkei were designated as “official partners,” comprising the second tier of domestic sponsors, the Sankei held a position as a third-tier domestic sponsor (e.g., Homma, 2021). Examining these major Japanese newspapers reveals the intricate interplay between their coverage of 2020 Tokyo Olympics and that of post-Fukushima environmental contamination.

This study starts by providing two theoretical frameworks: risk society and celebration capitalism. With the theoretical frameworks in place, the second section of this article delves into relevant literature, formulating a research question. The third section introduces critical discourse analysis (CDA) as the research method for scrutinizing Japanese national newspapers. The fourth section describes and analyzes how major Japanese newspapers portrayed radioactive materials in relation to the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. The fifth section discusses the primary findings of the research in relation to the theoretical frameworks and relevant literature on media coverage and environmental issues. The conclusion summarizes the key findings of this research and indicates their implications. This paper contributes to the field of sport communication studies by examining the 2020 Tokyo Olympics through the lens of risk society and celebration capitalism, focusing on mass media’s coverage of environmental issues in the non-Western contemporary society. In doing so, this article foregrounds the notion of contemporary risks to examine the linkage between sport-related environmental journalism and the capitalistic motivations surrounding the mega-sport event after the environmental disaster.

Theoretical Frameworks

In his book Risk Society, Beck (1992) argued that the over-advancement of science and technology has led to the emergence of unprecedented risks and theorized our contemporary society as a risk society where the outcomes are neither predictable nor calculable. Beck (1992) asserted that these “newer risks” (p. 27) defy quantification in determining their extent and impact, emphasizing radiation contamination as a prime exemplar. Unlike traditional dangers such as natural disasters, these modern risks, such as nuclear fallout, possess a distinct temporal scale. Beck’s conceptualization of risk assists us in discerning the temporal difference between recoveries from natural and nuclear disasters.

Furthermore, Beck (1992) pointed out that newer risks, such as radiation contamination, are generally imperceptible to our senses. His argument on the in/visibility of newer risks could also be clarified by differentiating the consequences of natural disasters from those of nuclear disasters; unlike the consequences of natural disasters, without media technologies, it is difficult, if not impossible, to see what the consequences of nuclear disasters actually are. At the same time, Beck did not fully elaborate on the role of mass media in representing contemporary risks; still, his view of contemporary risks, such as radiation contamination vis-à-vis older dangers, provides a fundamental theoretical framework for reconsidering the notion of the Recovery Olympics in terms of their different temporal scales and highlighting the role of media in making the imperceptible contamination socially meaningful in the public sphere.

Another key theoretical framework for this study is celebration capitalism, which was coined and developed by Boykoff (2014; 2021) and Boykoff and Gaffney (2020). In his book Celebration Capitalism and the Olympic Games, Boykoff (2014) developed the notion of celebration capitalism in relation to Klein (2007)’s notion of disaster capitalism by which she conceptualized how profit-seekers such as private corporations capitalized on disasters. In doing so, Boykoff (2014) maintains that celebration capitalism, which epitomizes the dynamism of capitalism, thrives on celebratory spectacle and collective euphoria in the state of exception “as an alibi to justify sidestepping normal democratic processes in the name of expediency, exigency, and urgency” (p.4). More notably, in relation to the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, Boykoff (2021) has argued that “an unprecedented synergy exists between disaster capitalism and celebration capitalism, whereby nationalism, hyper-consumerism, and ‘disaster recovery’ are fused and refashioned into a powerful political-economic spectacle fueled by feel-good Olympic ideology amid a volatile historical conjuncture” (p.53). With Boykoff (2021)’s framing of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, this article examines the role of mass media in creating media discourses about the Recovery Olympics under the state of nuclear emergency.

Literature Review

Building upon the theoretical frameworks, this section reviews and assesses existing literature on media discourses concerning large-scale sporting events and environmental issues, and the Japanese newspapers’ coverage of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics as the Recovery Olympics. Following a review of prior research, this section leverages the theoretical frameworks to formulate the research question for the present research.

A wealth of scholarly work has critically explored the nexus between sports events and various environmental issues, with particular emphasis on the political implications of environmental discourse (e.g., Kim & Chung, 2018; Millington et al., 2018; Yoon & Wilson, 2018). For example, considerable research has centered on the discourse of ecological modernization (EM) within the context of the Olympic Games (e.g., Kim, 2020; Kim & Chung, 2018; Millington et al., 2018) as well as the discourse of sustainability (e.g., Kietlinski, 2021; Millington et al., 2022).

Pertinent to the present study is the burgeoning field of research on mediated environmental discourses (e.g., Lenskyj, 1998) and sport-related environmental journalism (Yoon & Wilson, 2020). For instance, Yoon and Wilson (2018) examined South Korean media coverage concerning the contentious development of Mount Gariwang for the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics and Paralympic Games, particularly in light of depoliticization and politicization. They characterized depoliticization as the political processes for making “potentially contentious issues appear uncontroversial or not worthy of debate” (p.702) and politicization as the “processes for revealing competing sets of assumptions, values, interests, and power relations that underlie issues” (p.702). By focusing on non-Western media as a subject of research, they elucidated how environmental issues surrounding Mount Gariwang were either politicized or depoliticized within the South Korean journalism landscape. Yoon and Wilson (2018) revealed that conservative media depoliticized environmental concerns by deferring to expert opinions. In contrast, left-leaning media politicized the Games by including critical perspectives from nonexperts, such as environmental activists. Subsequently, Yoon and Wilson (2020) propounded six principles of sport-related environmental journalism or Environmental Sports Journalism (ESJ), one of which is “journalism that questions taken-for-granted assumptions and encourages a questioning of value norms” (p.186) – a principle intimately connected to the idea of politicization.

As such, critical scholars have highlighted the importance of environmental discourses to examine mega-sport events such as the Olympics critically. Despite their valuable contributions, the previous research on sports events has yet to explore radiation contamination as an exemplar of environmental concerns, nor has it examined the role of media in connection with the theoretical framework of risk society. To further our understanding of mass media’s role in sports events and environmental issues, this study expands upon existing literature, specifically drawing on Yoon and Wilson’s (2018) utilization of the concepts of politicization/depoliticization. This approach enables a more comprehensive analysis of the intersections between the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, post-Fukushima environmental contamination, and sport-related environmental journalism.

A number of studies have critically examined the portrayal of the relationship between the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and the triple disaster in Japanese newspapers (e.g., Ariga et al., 2021; Moritsu, 2022; Yamada, 2015). For instance, Sasao (2022) examined the portrayal of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics in relation to recovery, finding that the Kahoku Shimpō, as a regional newspaper of the Tōhoku Region, tended to hold more positive views on the Recovery Olympics compared to the Asahi. Ariga et al. (2021) scrutinized the newspaper discourse on the Recovery Olympics before and after the decision to postpone the event due to the COVID-19 pandemic, finding that the idea of recovery was only mentioned sporadically during the pandemic period. Furthermore, Moritsu (2022) analyzed editorials from Japanese newspapers that sponsored the Olympics (the Asahi, the Mainichi, the Yomiuri, and the Nikkei) and those that did not (the Kahoku Shimpō, the Tokyo Shimbun, the Miyazaki Nichinichi Shimbun, and the Okinawa Times), revealing that recovery was less frequently mentioned in the former group. However, scant attention has been paid to their coverage of the Olympics in connection with post-Fukushima environmental contamination. In response, this study offers an alternative approach to the recovery discourse by examining discussions pertaining to recovery from the Fukushima disaster, employing the frameworks of risk society and celebration capitalism. In line with this, this article employs Said (1997)’s concept of “covering” to discuss the media coverage of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and post-Fukushima environmental contamination.

This study probes the intricate interplay among major Japanese newspapers, their depiction of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics as the Recovery Olympics, and radioactive materials as a key facet of post-Fukushima environmental contamination. How did major Japanese newspapers address the issue of imperceptible radioactive materials as a long-term environmental contamination problem that would take an enormous amount of time to “solve,” both before and after the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, despite promoting the notion of the “Recovery Olympics” as a symbolic means of celebrating the political and economic benefits of the “exceptional” mega-sport event? The research question of this study is, thus, how did Japanese newspapers portray the 2020 Tokyo Olympics as the Recovery Olympics in relation to radioactive materials, between March 12th, 2011 and August 9th 2022?

Method

Dataset

Newspaper articles were retrieved from the online database of the Tokyo editions of the Asahi, the Mainichi, the Yomiuri, the Nikkei, and the Sankei (the morning edition). These newspapers were chosen for this research precisely because they were the most representative major national daily newspapers in Japan (e.g., Fujitake & Takeshita, 2018). The Asahi and the Mainichi are usually viewed as Japanese liberal dailies; the Yomiuri and the Sankei represent conservative newspapers; the Nikkei is a financial newspaper (e.g., Fujitake & Takeshita, 2018). As noted earlier, they were official partners of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, serving as sponsors for the international event (e.g., Homma, 2021).

The data collection period for the Japanese newspaper articles spans from March 12th, 2011 to August 9th, 2022. Prior research suggests that the Recovery Olympics discourse emerged immediately following the triple disaster (e.g., Yoshimi, 2020), prompting this study to focus on the time frame beginning on March 12th, 2011, one day after the disaster occurred. Furthermore, the analysis extends to August 9th, 2022, the 1-year anniversary of the closing ceremony of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. This allows for an exploration of how major newspapers discussed the relationship between the Recovery Olympics and radioactive materials in the year after serving as sponsors for the Olympics.

In the initial stage of data retrieval, articles referring directly to the terms “fukkō gorin” or “fukkō orimpikku” (both “the Recovery Olympics” in English) and “hōshasei busshitsu” (“radioactive material” in English), “hōshasen” (“radiation” in English) or “hōshanō” (“radioactivity” in English) were retrieved for this study because Japanese mass media were likely to use the terms related to radioactive materials interchangeably (e.g., Tanaka, 2013). The unit of analysis was an article. The dataset included 33 items for the Asahi; 17 items for the Mainichi; eight items for the Yomiuri; four items for the Nikkei; and 18 items for the Sankei. The initial data retrieval shows that the Asahi and the Mainichi, both of which are identified as liberal or left-leaning, published more articles referring to both the Recovery Olympics and radioactive materials than the rest of the three major national newspapers. Due to the significant disparity in the number of data extracted from each newspaper, this study does not aim to demonstrate the tendencies of each newspaper’s reporting. However, it is possible to shed some light on how the national newspapers, which were sponsors of the Olympics, discussed the environmental contamination caused by the Fukushima disaster in relation to the notion of the Recovery Olympics. Data collection took place in February 2023.

Data Analysis

While many scholars of communication and sport use CDA and investigate how language is used by individuals and institutions to produce and reproduce power relations and ideologies (e.g., Shin et al., 2022; Yoon & Wilson, 2016), this paper adopts Fairclough’s (2016) dialectical-relational approach to critical discourse analysis. Fairclough (2016) foregrounds the dialectical relations between semiosis and other non-semiotic social elements that constitute the social conditions of our domestic lives, to address the “social wrongs” (p.91). Just as Fairclough (2016) noted that “the specific methods used for a particular piece of research arise from the theoretical process of constructing its object” (p.91), this paper draws on risk society and celebration capitalism to engage with a discourse analysis of Japanese newspapers’ coverage of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics as the Recovery Olympics and radioactive materials. Drawing on Fairclough’s (2016) dialectical-relational approach to critical discourse analysis, I conducted a textual analysis of the articles and the multiple readings of the retrieved articles led to the formulation of two dominant themes regarding the Tokyo 2020 Olympics in relation to radioactive materials: the Recovery Olympics for covering radioactive materials in Fukushima and the Recovery Olympics for covering radioactive materials in accordance with Japan’s safety standards.

Findings

Overall, doing CDA indicates that there were no substantial differences between liberal mainstream newspapers (the Asahi and the Mainichi) and the other newspapers concerning their views of radioactive materials in relation to the Tokyo Olympics. Both liberal and conservative major newspapers addressed radioactive materials as environmental contamination in association with the concept of the Recovery Olympics. However, they ultimately contributed to the normalization of the state of nuclear emergency by covering radioactive materials before and after the Olympics. Simultaneously, they presented varying understandings of what counts as recovery from the Fukushima disaster.

Covering Radioactive Materials in Fukushima

The scope of the Fukushima disaster unequivocally extended beyond the boundaries of Fukushima Prefecture, as evidenced by various citizens and the Japanese state illustrating the spread of radioactive materials into other regions of East Japan (e.g., Abe, 2015, 2019; Minna-no Data Site, 2019). Despite this, Japanese newspapers refrained from discussing radioactive materials beyond the confines of Fukushima Prefecture in their articles on the Recovery Olympics. Instead, they localized the issue of post-Fukushima environmental contamination, framing it as a predominantly Fukushima-specific concern (e.g., Amano, 2016).

The Asahi, the Mainichi, the Yomiuri, the Nikkei, and the Sankei characterized radioactive materials within the Recovery Olympics discourse as a case of environmental contamination confined to Fukushima Prefecture. For example, the Sankei Shimbun (2013) explicitly delineated the spatial boundary of environmental contamination due to radioactive materials in its society section, with “Fukushima Prefecture” as the focal point, stating: “Fukushima Prefecture is grappling with issues such as the leakage of contaminated water from the Tokyo Electric Power Company’s Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant and the slow progress of decontamination of radioactive materials.”(p. 30) Furthermore, Iguchi (2020), a Mainichi Shimbun reporter, stated in the section on internal affairs on January 31, 2020:

Setting foot in Fukushima Prefecture for the first time…I realized I had unconsciously assumed all disaster victims were critical of the so-called “Recovery Olympics” as mere pretense. Visiting the site, I felt it was not in a state to genuinely promote recovery. As I drove along the coastal areas in a rental car, my eyes were drawn to the mountains of black flexible container bags, filled with decontamination waste, piled up in temporary storage sites scattered throughout. Barriers lined the houses in areas where the radiation levels were too high for residents to return. (p.10)

Iguchi (2020) explicitly referred to radioactive materials as post-Fukushima environmental contamination and critically reported the current situation of Fukushima Prefecture 6 months before the originally planned date of the opening ceremony of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. Although the Mainichi sponsored and promoted the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, Iguchi’s grounded view of radioactive materials as environmental contamination can be seen to critique the notion of the Recovery Olympics because it emphasized the necessity of not turning a blind eye to radioactive materials in Fukushima. However, such media discourse on radioactive materials inadvertently contributed to framing the post-Fukushima environmental contamination as a matter of Fukushima.

Similarly, the Asahi also presented various critical opinions on the Recovery Olympics and the environmental contamination caused by radioactive materials in different sections, such as the news and current affairs section (e.g., the Asahi Shimbun, 2018) and the lifestyle section (e.g., the Asahi Shimbun, 2019). For example, the Asahi Shimbun (2021b) published an article in the opinion section on July 28, 2021, where Hiroshi Murata, an evacuee living in Tokyo due to the Fukushima disaster, was reported to note as follows:

The term “Recovery Olympics” is, in fact, a sophistry. Nuclear evacuees remain displaced nationwide, with no clear plan for incident resolution. Still, the government desires to convey a message to the world that “the nuclear accident's impact was minimal,” with the Olympics serving as the culminating gesture. My area was under an “evacuation order,” so we were not considered “voluntary evacuees.” However, when the evacuation order was lifted in July 2016, both the government and Tokyo Electric Power Company began to categorize us as “voluntary evacuees,” leading to the termination of compensation and free housing provisions. Yet, my home remains contaminated with radioactive substances, with an annual radiation dose of 26 millisieverts measured from the ground beneath the rain gutter. Despite my wish to return, I simply cannot. (p.13)

As such, Murata provided a case that he could not return to his house in Fukushima due to the level of radioactive materials over the post-disaster public dose limit (20 millisieverts per year). Whereas the Asahi Shimbun (2021b) did not discuss the validity of his claim on the level of radioactive materials, Murata highlighted the quantitative elements of radioactive materials to demonstrate environmental contamination and criticized the Recovery Olympics discourse from the perspective of an evacuee from Fukushima. However, even in Murata’s published critical statement, the issue of environmental contamination caused by radioactive materials is discussed and framed solely as a problem within Fukushima Prefecture.

As seen in the case of Japanese television stations portraying those living in disaster-stricken areas and Fukushima as “others” when reporting on the decision to hold the 2020 Tokyo Olympics (Mizuide, 2016), Fukushima was objectified as “others,” through the media discourse that addresses the environmental issues brought about by radioactive materials. Though Japanese newspapers paid attention to the recovery of Fukushima in the articles regarding the Recovery Olympics, they simultaneously framed the issue of environmental contamination as a matter of Fukushima. In doing so, the Japanese newspapers indicated that although Fukushima’s recovery has been delayed (compared to other disaster-stricken areas) due to the nature of radioactive substances, post-Fukushima environmental contamination is not a serious matter for the Olympic Games in Tokyo. More importantly, the Japanese newspapers failed to contextualize their reporting of radioactive materials in relation to the state of nuclear emergency in effect throughout Japan; it accepted the state of exception where post-disaster public dose limit is applied during the Olympic Games. Ultimately, such media discourse on radioactive materials as post-Fukushima environmental contamination cannot be seen to make a critical intervention in celebration capitalism.

Covering Radioactive Materials in Accordance With Japan’s Safety Standards

Another prominent theme emerged tethered to a more scientific discourse: covering radioactive materials in accordance with Japan’s safety standards. The major Japanese newspapers foregrounded the idea of safety standards as scientific benchmarks to dismiss environmental concerns and ultimately referred to the post-Fukushima environmental contamination for promoting the Recovery Olympics. Among many articles directly or indirectly referring to safety standards in relation to the Recovery Olympics (e.g., Takeuchi, 2021; The Nihon Keizai Shimbun, 2019), for instance, the Nihon Keizai Shimbun (2019) featured fūhyō higai or baseless-rumor-induced damage in Fukushima Prefecture in relation to the notion of the Recovery Olympics, noting on March 12, 2019:

Some people go to other prefectures to buy vegetables even though there are radiation-tested ones that pass the inspection… even so, with the gradual lifting of evacuation orders and the recovery of sales for locally-produced vegetables, I can feel the current situation of recovery taking place step by step. (p.38)

In relation to the safety standards of inspection as a scientific measure, the Nihon Keizai Shimbun (2019) shed light on the issue of radioactive contamination affecting vegetables in Fukushima Prefecture. However, it indirectly downplayed environmental concerns in the prefecture as unfounded, while endorsing the concept of the Recovery Olympics. Moreover, the Yomiuri Shimbun (2021) more explicitly foregrounded the notion of safety standards as scientific benchmarks to describe food contamination in Fukushima in the third section on July 22, 2021 as follows.

Emphasizing food safety is crucial. Radioactive substances exceeding safety standards are rarely detected in food from disaster-hit areas due to stringent inspections. Yet, 14 countries and regions still restrict imports of Japanese agricultural products… Although food origins are shown in the Olympic Village cafe, they are not in the dining hall due to the variety of items. Reconstruction Minister Hirasawa stated at a press conference on the 20th that “we are missing an opportunity to promote food safety. We need to show it in some form.” (p.3)

As such, the Yomiuri Shimbun (2021) paid attention to the safety standards and drove a wedge between the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and post-Fukushima environmental contamination, using radioactive materials as an even useful resource to promote the 2020 Tokyo Olympics in terms of food safety. What is even more important is that the Yomiuri Shimbun (2021) discussed environmental contamination below safety standards as if it did not exist, while covering, if not concealing, the very existence of environmental pollution caused by radioactive materials. Furthermore, this discourse denies the existence of Beck’s conception of “newer risk” from the outset by relying on safety standards and assessing the environmental risks posed by radioactive materials quantitatively. Through their focus on the scientific indicator, major Japanese newspapers thus incorporated radiation materials below safety standards into the discourse of recovery for justifying the Olympics.

Discussion

In his book Covering Islam, Said (1997) ascribed a dual meaning to the term “covering” – covering as reporting the news about and covering as hiding the truth of the news – and examined the Western media’s portrayal (and distortion) of Islam. A parallel can be drawn with Japanese newspapers’ covering of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics as the Recovery Olympics in relation to radioactive materials. The findings indicated that Japanese newspapers “covered” radioactive materials for reconsidering the notion of the Recovery Olympics from a particular perspective, while they also “covered” them for justifying and promoting the Recovery Olympics discourse. In essence, however, the major Japanese newspapers referred to radioactive materials for promoting the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, without referencing the state of nuclear emergency.

While Yoon and Wilson (2018) shed light on the role of Korean conservative media in the depoliticization of environmental issues, this study suggests a similar pattern with Japanese national newspapers, which tended to depoliticize the post-Fukushima environmental contamination in their promotion of the Recovery Olympics. They ultimately circumvented discussions of the potential environmental impacts of radioactive materials in connection with the Recovery Olympics. In this process, the Japanese newspapers facilitated a dual in-visualization of post-Fukushima environmental contamination for the Tokyo Olympics as the Recovery Olympics. Firstly, they localized the issue of environmental contamination within the geographical boundaries of Fukushima Prefecture, thereby rendering the broader impacts invisible for the Olympics. Secondly, they underscored safety standards, framing radioactive contamination as a relic of the past, unrelated to the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, thus sidelining environmental concerns over radioactive materials and the ongoing existence of radioactive contamination. In encapsulating the 2020 Tokyo Olympics as the Recovery Olympics and referencing radioactive materials, these Japanese national newspapers contributed significantly to reshaping the communication landscape surrounding the state of nuclear emergency.

Accordingly, Japanese sport-related environmental journalism refrained from politicizing the notion of the Recovery Olympics by failing to consider the temporal scale of human-made environmental contamination resulting from radioactive materials in the context of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. Consequently, these Japanese newspapers were unable to probe the paradox of Japan hosting the Olympics amidst an ongoing nuclear emergency. Their position facilitated the hosting of the Olympics in these extraordinary circumstances, setting a fundamental premise for viewing the 2020 Tokyo Olympics as the Recovery Olympics. Echoing Boykoff (2021)’s perspective of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics as a combination of celebration capitalism and disaster capitalism, these major Japanese national newspapers, all sponsors of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, contributed to justifying the event under the state of nuclear emergency by sidestepping normal risk governance processes after the Fukushima nuclear disaster, all in the name of the recovery. Despite their mention of post-Fukushima environmental contamination in articles framing the 2020 Tokyo Olympics as the Recovery Olympics, these leading Japanese newspapers failed to adhere to the principle of ESJ established by Yoon and Wilson (2020).

Previous research has highlighted the interplay between media portrayal of sports events and environmental concerns (Lenskyj, 1998; Yoon & Wilson, 2018). This study, however, unveiled an intriguing nuance: even critical and scientific environmental discourse in media can be harnessed as a persuasive tool to legitimize large-scale sports events in the aftermath of environmental disasters. Notably, despite the absence of an explicit pro-business, environmental modernist stance following such a disaster, the mass media’s coverage of environmental contamination served to decouple the post-Fukushima contamination issue from the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. This detachment ultimately facilitated the engagement of international athletes in the Games, even under the state of nuclear emergency.

Moreover, this study has filled a gap in the body of research on celebration capitalism by spotlighting Beck’s notion of newer risks. While Boykoff (2021) characterized the 2020 Tokyo Olympics as “an unprecedented synergy…between disaster capitalism and celebration capitalism” (p.53), this study has further reframed the concept of the triple disaster, considering it not as a single event but as different events with distinct temporal scales. In doing so, it has underscored the role of mass media in “covering” radioactive materials in the process of “covering” the Recovery Olympics after the environmental disaster, leaving aside the issue of the persistent state of nuclear emergency in Japan.

Conclusion

This paper dissected the notion of the Recovery Olympics by differentiating the recovery from the earthquake and tsunami from that of the Fukushima nuclear disaster to investigate the role of major Japanese newspapers in creating media discourse on the Recovery Olympics in relation to radioactive materials. In so doing, this article revealed the politics of defining what was being recovered from, demonstrating the need to reconsider the notion of the Recovery Olympics from the triple disaster as a single event. However, the aim was not to marginalize the devastating consequences of the earthquake and tsunami from the analysis of Japanese newspapers’ portrayal of the Recovery Olympics but to provide an alternative view of the notion in relation to the uncommon but serious environmental issue.

While many scholars discussed sport mega-events, including the Olympic Games, environmental issues, and mass media, indicating that mass media have not explicitly encouraged but have tacitly condoned the environmental degradation caused by mega-sporting events such as the Olympics (e.g., Yoon & Wilson, 2018), this study demonstrated that Japanese newspapers “covered” the radioactive materials for “covering” the 2020 Tokyo Olympics as the Recovery Olympics. Specifically, Japanese newspapers “covered” the environmental problems caused by radioactive materials, either by treating them as socially non-existent or by downplaying them as issues exclusive to Fukushima Prefecture rather than as issues affecting the areas outside the prefecture. By doing so, the Japanese newspapers simultaneously “covered” the 2020 Tokyo Olympics as the Recovery Olympics from the environmental disaster. Ultimately, they not only served as sponsors for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics but also understated potential negative impacts from the environmental contamination after the Fukushima disaster in the name of the Olympics. This process created what Boykoff (2014) describes as “a state of exception where the normal rules of politics do not apply” (p.5), where the 2020 Tokyo Olympics overshadowed the pressing need to consider the recovery from the environmental disaster.

While focusing mainly on major Japanese newspapers, this study did not adequately consider other media outlets, such as television, in relation to the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and radioactive materials. Nonetheless, it was the first to separate the earthquake and tsunami from the Fukushima disaster, offering invaluable insights for future critical discussions on sports events held in the name of recovery.

Footnotes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and publication of this article.

Funding

This work was supported by JSPS KAKENHI Grant Number 21K12910.

ORCID iD

Yasuhito Abe

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