It seems probable that Schumpeter thought of ‘Business Cycles’, at least before publication, as his magnum opus. It was, of course, immediately recognized, at least in the United States, as a major contribution to business cycle theory and economic theory more generally, and was accorded a major review article by Kuznets (1940) in the American Economic Review. Yet, half a century later it cannot be said that Business Cycles occupies a place in the history of economic thought comparable to the major works of Marx, Keynes or Ricardo, or even other works of Schumpeter himself.

The ambitious scope of the book is evident from the full title: Business Cycles: A Theoretical, Historical and Statistical Analysis of the Capitalist Process and its two volumes, comprising more than a thousand pages, bear further witness to the magnitude of the enterprise. Schumpeter always regarded business cycles not as a sideline or a speciality, but as a major manifestation of his theory of economic development and growth in capitalist economies. Already in the Theory of Economic Development he included a chapter on business cycles that foreshadowed his later work. Moreover, although he greatly admired Marx's intellectual achievement and gave him credit for being one of the first theorists to recognize cycles and address these problems, he nevertheless chided Marx (Schumpeter 1943, 36–39) for supposedly failing to develop any systematic theoretical explanation of crises and for holding an eclectic view embracing many possible causes.