Despite the protests and criticisms before the event, the Tokyo Olympics overcame the threat of the raging Delta variant and came to a nuanced end on August 8. While Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga thanked the Japanese people’s understanding and cooperation to “fulfill our responsibility as the host nation,” Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi praised the country’s only gold medal winner as the Olympic games concluded with relative success in maintaining the “Olympic bubble.”

Among the Rising Powers, China walked away with the most medals at 88, ranking at second place behind the United States. Japan exceeds its own record at 58 medals in total. Despite having limited participation while competing under the disguise of ROC (Russian Olympic Committee) as a consequence of the doping scandal, Russia was able to grab 70 medals. Meanwhile, India had its best ever Olympics games with 7 medals in total.

In this Policy Alert, we examine what conclusions Rising Powers are drawing from the widely scrutinized Tokyo Olympics.

Read the Policy Alert here.