The Communist Manifesto was a one-party state under the rule of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU). Unlike their mass-based counterparts of the Second International, the CPSU and other Leninist parties like it in the Third International expected their members to know the classic works of Marx, Engels and Lenin. Further, party leaders were expected to base their policy decisions on Marxist-Leninist ideology. Therefore works such as the "Manifesto" were required reading for the party rank-and-file. Therefore the widespread dissemination of Marx and Engels' works became an important policy objective; backed by a sovereign state, the CPSU had relatively inexhaustible resources
Manifesto of the Sixteen was for reasons unknown not an initial signatory. The manifesto was countersigned by approximately one hundred other anarchists, half of whom were Italian anarchists. The publication of the "Manifesto" was met with great disapproval by the international anarchist movement, and in considering its impact, George Woodcock stated that it "merely confirmed the split which existed in the anarchist movement." The signatories of the "Manifesto" saw the First World War as a battle between German imperialism and the international working class. In contrast, most anarchists of the time, including Emma Goldman and Alexander Berkman, saw the war as being that of