To talk about planning an economic system is to talk in old terms, and I find myself sometimes having to teach Westerners about what the market really means.

"not a scientific body capable of accurately assessing the facts about global warming".

Then in 1969, I spent the spring term at Cornell University in New York. The invasion of August 1968 had already happened, but the hardline regime took several months to crack down on dissidents.

But how can you speed up the transformation of society in a country as large as Russia? Those sounding the moral outcry are the ones who are trying to dictate their standards from the outside. Of course, that isn't the right way to go either. One cannot impose democracy from the other side of national borders, which is something we ourselves experienced during the communist era. The West's policies toward Eastern Europe, the Helsinki process - none of that really helped us.

By the time I returned to Czechoslovakia, I had an understanding of the principles of the market.

I never intended to be a politician or office-seeker.

I also helped write the five-page statement of principles that Civic Forum issued in late November. That was the first public expression of what the new government wanted to do.