In 1988, after the rise of Mikhail Gorbachev and perestroika, he was permitted to resume his studies at the GITIS, graduating in the same year, and became coordinator of the Moscow People's Front. In 1990, he was elected to the Moscow City Soviet and to the Executive of the Socialist Party of Russia. He co-founded the Party of Labour in October 1992. In October 1993, the former Soviet dissident was arrested, with two other members of his party, for his opposition to President Boris Yeltsin during the September—October constitutional crisis, but was released the next day after international protests. Later that year, his job and the Moscow City Soviet were abolished under Yeltsin's new constitution. The events and his experiences during this momentous period are documented in his book, "Square Wheels: How Russian Democracy Got Derailed".