ABSTRACT
Real democratization is unthinkable without the creation of new democratic institutions and without structural changes in political, social, and public life; in short, organizationally secured changes are needed. Glasnost is the path to this type of change. Glasnost's cost means the protests of the Crimean Tatars, the activities of the chauvinistic society Pamiat, the demonstrations of the refuseniks, the meetings in Nagornyi Karabakh, and the outrageous behavior of our own primitive "rockers" and "punks." Glasnost is undergoing some serious tests, and its every success is greeted with a sigh of relief. Glasnost is not a decree that has been promulgated, nor a condition that has been attained, but a process—a complex, painful process, which often proceeds haltingly, but which, like the air we breathe, is essential to our society as it tries to reform itself. Glasnost is inevitable and irreversible only to the extent that we ourselves, through our own efforts, make it so.
