Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was a communist revolutionary and Soviet politician who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until his death in 1953. He held power as General Secretary of the Communist Party from 1922 to 1952 and Chairman of the Council of Ministers from 1941 until his death. Despite initially governing the country as part of a collective leadership, Stalin consolidated power to become the Soviet Union's undisputed dictator by the 1930s. He formalised his Leninist interpretation of Marxism as Marxism–Leninism, while the totalitarian political system he established became known as Stalinism.