Mr. Putin’s Game

Russians and a lot of Russia watchers have been wondering not if, but how Russia's president, Vladimir Putin, would hold on to power. We fear we got our answer yesterday.

Mr. Putin, who must step down as president next year, announced that he will head the election list of the dominant party, United Russia, in December's parliamentary election. That will guarantee him a seat in the lower house, from which he could become prime minister. Mr. Putin said that it was still too early to think about that, and it would depend on whether the next Russian president was "a decent, capable and effective person" with whom he could work. Conveniently, Russia's Constitution puts the prime minister in direct line to succeed the country's president, should that job description prove too much for Mr. Putin's successor to handle.

Mr. Putin has insisted all along that his goal was to create a Russia that is strong, modern and internationally respected. This crass political manipulation will have the opposite effect, weakening Russia in the eyes of the world and eventually its own citizens.

After the chaos of the first post-Communist years, Mr. Putin restored a measure of security and stability. He has also done serious damage to the country's fragile democratic institutions, creating a powerful and secretive presidential bureaucracy, imposing authoritarian controls over government and the press, and turning the Parliament into a rubber stamp. In effect, he led Russia back to its historical dependence on one powerful leader, and he did this with the support of a large majority of the Russian people.

We cannot begrudge the Russians a measure of stability and prosperity after what they have gone through. But what they need now is to start building a true democracy on the basis of that stability and prosperity.

We hope Mr. Putin will rethink this cynical game. If he does run for Parliament, he could use his seat to share his experience and skills with a new political generation - but we doubt it. If his only intention is to hold on to power, then he will be proclaiming that institutions don't matter, only the person manipulating them. Russia's been there, too long. That is not what it needs now.