It will soon be 10 years since Boris Yeltsin launched the first war in Chechnya, and five years since Vladimir Putin resumed it. The result is clear: The war is destroying Russia and merging with international terrorism.

The streak of terrorist attacks, culminating with the horror of Beslan, has confirmed that Russia has a systemic problem. The various immediate responses — the investigative commissions of the Council of Federation, the creation of neighborhood patrols, the firing of government ministers and the dismissal of regional governments — are not only insufficient, they are a senseless imitation of activity to quell public opinion.

This does not mean that we don’t need to reform the law-enforcement and intelligence services, or that we don’t need to strengthen oversight and control. All this is necessary. But in our situation, all these scratches on the surface do not resolve the problem of security.

To confront terrorism, we need to fundamentally change the political and economic system that has taken shape in Russia over the last 10 years.

This system, so familiar to Russia, has at least seven attributes: absence of independent and politically meaningful mass media; absence of an independent parliament; absence of an independent judiciary; absence of civil control over intelligence and law-enforcement agencies; absence of free elections; the complete fusion of business and government; and rule by clans.

Clearly, the organic medium for such a system is widespread corruption, the suppression of independent parties and opinion, and the fragmentation and deterioration of civic organizations.

What is the public face of this system? Only lies and evasions. We see this daily. The freedom of expression we had in the early 1990s has been exchanged for money, property and power. This did not come about by chance. It was deliberately and consciously created under slogans such as, «We’re not ready yet,» or «Democracy is not for Russia.» The system was touted as «managed democracy,» «stability.»

This system is perfectly suitable for a narrow group of people that calls itself «the state,» and for their economic interests. The intelligence and law-enforcement services are designed to provide security for this group. They are not suited for protecting citizens from danger, or from terrorism.

Thus the issue in Beslan is not what exactly happened, or who did what or made which decisions. It is that the whole system reacted to protect those in power, their priorities, their ambitions — and not the people, not the children.

The political, social and economic system in place in today’s Russia is incapable of defending the country against terrorism — or of creating a modern competitive economy, or of ensuring a dignified life for its citizens. All these cosmetic measures — firings and appointments, commissions and ukases — are not going to help.

Yet this is not the whole problem. Under the conditions of life on the ruins of the Soviet system, under the leadership of the worst elements of the Soviet nomenclature and the total breakdown of all moral and cultural guideposts, the organized manipulation of the people has borne fruits.

There is no one to change the system.

Still, we have to swim on. We cannot go to the bottom in this sea of cynicism and lies. The broad signposts are there: Our Constitution, with all its many imperfections, presupposes real separation of powers between the executive, legislative and judicial; public television and the abolition of censorship; civil control over the activities of the government and the security forces; the inviolability of private property, and fair competition. We have most of the answers to the question, «What to do?» The main question is how.

First step: a widespread public demand for open access to politically significant mass media, and an end to unconstitutional state censorship. This would enable people to discuss what is happening in the country, to explain the nature of terrorism in Russia, to talk about corruption, about the shadow economy, about all the other subjects that are forbidden today.

Of course, a precondition for this is that real information be made available. We need to make people understand, and the authorities acknowledge that reporters are not agents of terrorists or bandits, but responsible people capable of making independent decisions. We need to demand that the authorities stop gagging journalists when they try to report that the school is surrounded by an armed and uncontrollable crowd, and that this will lead to catastrophe.

We need a real, massive street campaign against lies. Eventually, that could lead to a dialogue with the leadership. But first, we simply need to let people talk and listen. Through an open, unmanipulated, uncastrated national debate, we could gradually develop a fundamental idea of what our country is, based on freedom, responsibility and moderation.

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Grigory Yavlinsky is the leader of the Yabloko Party, the oldest liberal party in Russia.

The text on The International Herald Tribune:
http://www.iht.com/articles/2004/09/25/edyavlinsky_ed3_.php