Rand herself prefaces Anthem by exhorting collectivists, those who believe in uniting individual labor efforts under the auspices of the single government for the good of the whole, to acknowledge that they are forcing individuals into slavery. She asserts that social goals have become commonplace in society, and that it should be obvious to all people that the world is headed toward a complete disintegration of the kind she portrays in Anthem. She wants those who advocate such goals to be honest about their intentions, and where their intentions may lead, so that in the future, when the world completely yields to the ideals of the collective, and people find themselves slaves, they will not be able to deny that they chose their own paths.
Rand also is careful to emphasize that in this, the American edition of the novel, she has not changed any of Anthem’s substance. She notes that she has only clarified the language and not changed the spirit of the novella. She claims the idea of objectivism has always been clear and does not need any further examination.