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As Historicus shows, Stalin and the Leninist-Marxists before him were out to evolve a "science" of revolutions, a way of charting the ups & downs of social systems. This is not quite on a par with the science of physics, but it is at least parallel to, say, the Dow theory of stockmarket behavior. Some stock traders look to the Dow theory to tell them when to buy or sell. Stalin and the other Marxists wanted a theory that would tell them when a "break" was likely in the Imperialist Front. They kept their eye glued to "the material life of society." The big thing in it, they found, is "the means of production of material goods." The means of production "determines" two things especially: the kind of social system that prevails, and "the evolution of society from one system to another."
Here Stalin & Co. came to pay dirt. The means of production under capitalism involves a contradiction between "productive forces" (the tools and the workers) and "productive relations" (the relations between capitalists and laborers). New tools or equipment make the old capitalist-labor relations obsolete. The new productive forces require "social ownership" (Communism) for their full expansion. Otherwise, there will be depressions, in which shoe-factory workers, as an example, will be out of work at the same time that they (and others) need shoes.
This is the so-called Primary Contradiction of Capitalism, and is the sockdolager of the Marxist argument. In the long run, as Stalin reasons, the depressions will come oftener & oftener, and thus Communism will have to take over. Under Communism, the shoe factories will work as long as people need shoes.
Such is the "scientific" certainty with which Stalin reasons that capitalism is inevitably on the way out.
The big central contradiction of capitalism, which Marx elaborated in Das Kapital, gives birth to three other contradictions. They are all grist to Stalin's mill.
The first is the "class struggle." Under capitalism the main antagonists are the capitalists and the proletariat—the industrial workers. The other elements, such as the farmers and the middle class, fluctuate and drift. The proletariat, Stalin concludes, is the inevitable vehicle for revolution.
The second contradiction is between capitalistic countries and their colonies. Stalin contends that, within an empire, this is the counterpart of the class struggle. This contradiction results in crises and in national-liberation movements.
The third contradiction is between rival capitalistic empires, which, says Stalin, started the two world wars.
After World War I, there arose a fourth contradiction—between the capitalistic "camp" and the anticapitalistic Soviet Union.
The Crisis Factory
Historicus goes on to trace how Stalin uses the above contradictions.