In the novel, Goldstein is rumoured to be a former top member of the ruling (and sole) Party who had broken away early in the movement and started an organization known as "The Brotherhood", dedicated to the fall of The Party. The novel raises but leaves unanswered the questions of whether Goldstein, "The Brotherhood," or even "Big Brother" really exist.

Each member of "The Brotherhood" is required to read the book supposedly written by Goldstein, The Theory and Practice of Oligarchical Collectivism. Each person is said to have three or four contacts at one time which are replaced as people disappear, so that if a member is captured, he can only give up three or four others.

Goldstein is always the subject of the "Two Minutes Hate," a daily, 2-minute period beginning at 11:00 AM at which a purported image of Goldstein is shown on the telescreen (a one-channel television with surveillance devices in it that cannot be turned off). The reader may surmise that a political opposition to Big Brother...namely, Goldstein...was psychologically necessary in order to provide an internal enemy posing a threat to the rule of the Party; the constantly reiterated ritual of the Two Minutes Hate help ensure that popular support for and devotion towards Big Brother is continuous.

It is never revealed whether Goldstein really exists. In fact, Inner Party member O'Brien adamantly refuses to reveal whether or not The Brotherhood truly exists when asked by Winston in the torture room:

Although O'Brien claims to have collaborated in writing the book himself, his statement still leaves the questions of Goldstein and the Brotherhood's existence unanswered, as it could have been an untrue statement made by O'Brien in order to manipulate Winston's thinking and break his spirit.

Christopher Hitchens has claimed that the character is based on Leon Trotsky and that Goldstein's book is likewise based on Trotsky's The Revolution Betrayed. Orwell wrote of Trotskyism that:

The name "Goldstein" is German Jewish, just as is Trotsky's original surname Bronstein. The first name Emmanuel means "God with us"; his whole name would be a metaphor for a Messiah character, just as many Trotskyists held Leon Trotsky as the deliverer from Stalin's dictatorship. His name can also refer to Emma Goldman, a notable anarchist. Emmanuel may be a reference to Rabbi Emmanuel Rabinovich, a nonexistent orator that was used as a source to fuel anti-semitic propaganda, much as Emmanuel Goldstein was to be the common focus of anger for the society in the novel.

In the "initiation ceremony" into the Brotherhood, as depicted in the novel, the characters of Winston and Julia are required to swear to complete and unconditional obedience, including taking the obligation to obey such orders as killing hundreds of innocents or pouring acid on a child's face. This suggests that in fact the Brotherhood is as tyrannical and authoritarian as the Party, and that if it ever gained power there would be little real change. This accords with the theory that the Brotherhood represents the Trotskyists, whom Orwell saw as little different fundamentally from the Communists. However, the initiation ceremony may have been completely fabricated or at least distorted by inner party member O'Brien to test Winston's loyalty to Big Brother.

The name Emmanuel Goldstein was taken as a pseudonym by Eric Corley, editor of The Hacker Quarterly. The 1995 film Hackers has a character known as "Cereal Killer" (who, when first introduced in the film, makes reference to Orwell and Nineteen Eighty-Four in a diatribe about social security numbers) with the given name of Emmanuel Goldstein. The Internet Movie Database lists Corley as an (uncredited) consultant during the making of this movie.