The 2nd volume of the Complete Works of J. V. Stalin contains writings that were mainly produced during the period from the second half of 1907 to 1913, up until J. V. Stalin's exile in the Turukhansk region, where he remained until February 1917.

These works primarily encompass two periods of J. V. Stalin's revolutionary activity: his period of action in Baku and his period of action in Petrograd. The works relating to the first half of 1907 are dedicated to the tactics of the Bolsheviks during the time of the first Russian revolution.

The works written from June 1907 during J. V. Stalin's revolutionary activity mainly in Baku illuminate the struggle of the Bolsheviks against the Menshevik liquidationists for the preservation and consolidation of the illegal revolutionary Marxist Party.

From the second half of 1911, a period of J. V. Stalin's revolutionary activity in Petrograd begins (1911-1913). J. V. Stalin, head of the Russian Office of the Central Committee, guides the Party's work in Russia to implement the decisions of the Party Conference in Prague.

The 2nd volume also includes the famous work of J. V. Stalin "Marxism and the National Question," where the Bolshevik theory on the Program for the national question is developed.