Book: Problems of Leninism

Overview
"Problems of Leninism" (1934) gathers Joseph Stalin’s speeches, reports, and polemical essays from the mid-1920s to the early 1930s into a single doctrinal statement of Leninism as interpreted by the Soviet leadership after Lenin’s death. It codifies central tenets that became inseparable from Stalin-era policy: the nature of the dictatorship of the proletariat, the role of the party, the national question, industrialization and collectivization, and the strategy of building socialism under conditions of capitalist encirclement. The volume functions as both a theoretical synthesis and a manual for cadres, linking abstract principles to the Soviet Union’s practical campaigns.

Historical Context and Purpose
Compiled amid the USSR’s rapid transformation, it reflects the aftermath of civil war, consolidation of one-party rule, and the launch of the Five-Year Plans. By 1934, the regime proclaimed major successes in heavy industry and the collectivization of agriculture, and the 17th Party Congress styled itself the Congress of Victors. The text frames these developments as vindications of Leninism under new conditions, while rebuking internal currents, Trotskyism, the so-called Left and Right deviations, and external foes. The overarching purpose is to define the general line of the party as the only correct application of Lenin’s legacy.

Core Concepts
At the heart is the claim that Leninism is Marxism adapted to the epoch of imperialism and proletarian revolution. Stalin emphasizes the law of uneven development, arguing that capitalism breaks along its weakest links, which permits the socialist breakthrough in one country. From this follows the signature thesis: the possibility and necessity of building socialism in a single country, with the Soviet Union serving as the base of world revolution while not passively awaiting simultaneous revolts elsewhere.

The dictatorship of the proletariat is presented as an instrument that must be strengthened, not relaxed, as socialism advances. Class struggle, he argues, sharpens during the transition because defeated exploiting classes resist more fiercely. Hence the necessity of a centralized vanguard party practicing democratic centralism, strict discipline, cadre selection, and systematic criticism and self-criticism to fight bureaucratism and opportunism.

Strategy for Socialism in the USSR
The alliance of the working class with the peasantry is recast for a new stage. Differentiating poor, middle, and kulak peasants, Stalin defends forced-paced collectivization as solving the grain procurement crisis and providing a socialist basis for agriculture. Industrialization, especially heavy industry, is declared the strategic fulcrum for economic independence and defense. Planning, socialist property, and state control over the commanding heights are treated as levers that reveal the superiority of the socialist system over market anarchy.

On state and law, the text justifies a strong state apparatus during the transition, maintaining that the withering away of the state is a distant objective, postponed by capitalist encirclement and internal sabotage. Socialist legality is affirmed while validating measures against class enemies.

National and International Questions
On the national question, the book reiterates the right of nations to self-determination while denouncing both Great-Russian chauvinism and local bourgeois nationalism. The union of Soviet republics is presented as a voluntary federation under proletarian leadership, with cultural development pursued to integrate diverse peoples into socialism.

Internationally, imperialism makes wars inevitable, and the Comintern’s task is to prepare for revolutionary crises, expose social-democracy as a conduit of bourgeois influence, and defend the Soviet state. Tactics are to be subordinated to strategy: protecting the USSR as the base of the world movement while exploiting contradictions among imperialists.

Significance
"Problems of Leninism" crystallized the ideological foundations of Stalin-era policy: socialism in one country, rapid industrialization, collectivization, centralized party leadership, and heightened vigilance under the dictatorship of the proletariat. It supplied the conceptual vocabulary for subsequent campaigns, served as a training text across the communist world, and framed debates about orthodoxy and deviation. As a synthesis, it defined what Leninism meant for a generation of party members and helped institutionalize a distinct Stalinist canon within global communism.