THEIR ADENAUER:

One year after the overthrow of Hosni Mubarak brought Mr. Shater freedom, he has emerged as the most decisive voice in the leadership of the Brotherhood, the 83-year-old fountainhead of political Islam, at the moment when it has established itself as the dominant power in Egyptian politics.

With firm control of Egypt's Parliament, the Brotherhood's political arm is holding talks to form the next cabinet while Mr. Shater is grooming about 500 future officials to form a government-in-waiting. As the group's chief policy architect, Mr. Shater is overseeing the blueprint for the new Egypt, negotiating with its current military rulers over their future role, shaping its relations with Israel and a domestic Christian minority, and devising the economic policies the Brotherhood hopes will revive Egypt's moribund economy.

With power he could only dream of when he padded around Mr. Mubarak's prisons in a white track suit, Mr. Shater meets foreign ambassadors, the executives of multinational corporations and Wall Street firms, and a parade of United States senators and other officials to explain the Brotherhood's vision. To the Brotherhood, he tells them, Islam requires democracy, free markets and tolerance of religious minorities.

But he also says that recent elections have proved that Egyptians demand an explicitly Islamic state.

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