The 3rd volume of the Collected Works of J. V. Stalin contains the key writings that pertain to the period of preparation for the Great Socialist Revolution of October 1917. In 1917, J. V. Stalin, in collaboration with V. I. Lenin, was guiding the Bolshevik Party and the working class fighting for the conquest of state power.

A significant part of J. V. Stalin's works published in the 3rd volume is dedicated to the issues of Bolshevik leadership of the masses during the days of the June and July demonstrations, during the elections for the municipal council of Petrograd, as well as for the district councils of the same city.

Another part concerns the problems of the Party's struggle to transform the Soviets from mobilizing organs of the masses into organs of uprising, into organs of proletarian power. Most of the articles by J. V. Stalin contained in this volume were published in the book On the Road to October, which was released in 1925 in two editions.

These articles were published for the first time in the newspaper Pravda, the central organ of the Bolshevik Party, which also appeared under the titles Proletarian, Rabotchi, Rabotchi Put, and in the Bolshevik newspapers Soldatskaya Pravda, Proletarskoe Delo, Rabotchi i Soldat, and others.