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The Institute of Contemporary Development, whose board of trustees is headed by President Dmitry Medvedev, prepared a report entitled “Russia of the 21st century: the image of the desired tomorrow.” As Vedomosti writes, much of the model of tomorrow's Russia, as it should be according to the authors of the report, is similar to the scheme that existed under President Boris Yeltsin.

The report, naturally, talks about modernization, the need for which the president talks so much about. And modernization requires de-bureaucratization of the economy, and de-bureaucratization of the economy requires “de-economization of the bureaucracy”—the suppression of income from the performance of government functions. The authors of the report emphasize the need for political pluralism, a change in various forces in power (this, however, is not very similar to Yeltsin’s Russia, except perhaps if we consider the change in groups influencing the president), and an independent court.

The section of the report devoted to the political future has a rather bold subtitle: “back to the Constitution” - apparently, the authors believe that the current government does not respect the Constitution. The report proposes to reduce the term of office of the president to five years, and for the Duma to return to four years of the next convocation and to the majoritarian-proportional principle, that is, to replenish it not only with party lists, but with single-mandate members. At the same time, there must be as many as 20 parties, pre-election blocs are allowed, and even independent single-mandate members can get up to 50 seats in parliament and create a deputy group. The entry barrier should be reduced to 5% (for election blocs it will remain at 7%).

Even though there are 20 parties, the authors still focus on two key ones - center-right and center-left, that is, expressing the interests of the middle class and business in traditional industries, respectively. At the same time, the report states that in tomorrow's Russia at least 50% of the country's population will belong to the middle class. The communists will turn into the new left and will receive no more than 4% in the elections, as well as the heirs of the LDPR. The president and the parliamentary majority may belong to different parties.

Governors will be elected again (as Vedomosti reminds, Russia will not need this for another ninety years, according to Medvedev). Senators too, but still from candidates proposed by governors and regional legislative assemblies.

Much attention is paid in the report to the fate of security forces. Thus, the Ministry of Internal Affairs will be reorganized into the Federal Criminal Police Service. In the regions, public safety and minor crimes will be handled by police services subordinate to governors, and in cities and villages by municipal police. The newspaper recalls that Medvedev recently spoke about the need to federalize the police, while the authors of the report propose decentralization. There will be no traffic police either; its functions will be distributed between the police and the civil traffic service. The Federal Financial Police Service will combat economic crime. The FSB will be renamed back to FSK, and some of its responsibilities will be transferred to the Federal Service for the Protection of the Constitution, which will deal with preventing terrorist attacks and threats of separatism.

The armed forces will be staffed only by volunteers (conscription will be abolished), instead of a million (the Ministry of Defense plans to reduce the army to this number by 2012), 500-600 thousand people will serve in them.

Perhaps the most radical thing in the report: Russia will join the EU and NATO, while the CIS will remain, and even include Georgia (the newspaper notes that the report does not say anything about Abkhazia and South Ossetia).

The authors of the report insist on the absence of state control over the media and rely on digital television, which will deprive federal channels of their monopoly.

At the same time, Yevgeny Gontmakher, a member of the board of the Institute of Contemporary Development, noted to Vedomosti that the report was written not for Medvedev, but to stimulate discussion in society.