W. Paul Cockshott

Calculation, complexity and planning: the socialist calculation debate once again

This article offers a reassessment of the socialist calulation debate, and examines the extent to which the conclusions of that debate must be modified in the light of the subsequent development of the theory and technology of computation. Following an introduction to the two main perspectives on the debate which have been offered to date, we examine the classic case mounted by von Mises against the possibility of rational economic calculation under socialism. We discuss the response given by Oskar Lange, along with the counterarguments to Lange from the Austrian point of view. Finally we present what we call the ‘absent reponse’, namely a reassertion of the classic Marxian argument for economic calculation in terms of labour time. We argue that labour-time calculation is defensible as a rational procedure, when supplemented by algorithms which allow consumer choice to guide the allocation of resources, and that such calculation is now technically feasible with the type of computing machinery currently av...

Does Marx Need to Transform

Almost all of the voluminous literature on the Marxian ‘transformation problem’ is predicated on the assumption that, whether or not he succeeded, what Marx was trying to do in part 2, volume III of Capital — namely to derive a set of prices consistent with the equalisation of the rate of profit across all capitals — was correct. Those neo-Ricardians who argue that there is really no transformation problem as such (on the ground that labour values are theoretically redundant — see Steedman, 1977) most emphatically share this assumption.

Implementation of lattice gases using FPGAs

Lattice gas models have been widely studied over the last decade due to their simplicity and scope for parallelism. Standard parallel computers based on the stored-program paradigm can run such models quickly but are expensive. We report here a new approach based on reconfigurable logic circuits. A circuit is constructed to realize the behaviour of the model. The suitability of this method is demonstrated by modelling sound propagation in a lattice gas. For this application it is shown that supercomputer performance can be achieved at a fraction of supercomputer cost.

DAIS: An Object-Addressed Processor Cache

DAIS is a proposed processor incorporating hardware-based object addressing. By providing only the very minimum of support for objects, it allows efficient access via a novel caching scheme. Object addressing is supported at the instruction level, with virtually the same performance as a processor using virtual addressing. This paper begins with a justification of the method by which objects are accessed in the DAIS design, and then goes on to describe the hardware caching mechanisms to efficiently support it. Finally, some analysis of benchmarks is given, and dynamic program traces are used to show the performance of the caching scheme.

Design of POMP - a Persistent Object Management Processor

Pomp is a single board persistent object management processor designed to fit into a Sun Computer. When attached to a SUN Vme Bus computer it will allow that machine to create and manipulate a graph of persistent objects. These objects will exist over the lifetime of the hardware, and beyond that provided that other machines capable of reading the archive media exist

REFLECTIONS ON ECONOMIC DEMOCRACY

We revisit the model of socialism proposed in our Towards a New Socialism (1993) and attempt to answer various questions that have been raised regarding the connection between our view of socialism and our perspective on capitalism, the process of transition to socialism, the failings of the Soviet model, the relationship between socialism and communism, the role of direct democracy under socialism, and the use of labor-time calculation in a socialist economy. We argue that the contradictions of capitalist property relations, and of the accumulation process on a world scale, are set to present once again the necessity of the abolition of private property during the 21st century, and offer some thoughts on transitional forms that could implement this abolition. We defend the ideas of direct democracy and economic calculation in terms of labor time, and argue that these elements distinguish our proposals from the Soviet model. We trace the demise of the latter both to specifics of the Russian situation and to more general problems of Leninism, notably Lenin’s conception of the council state, and of socialism as a long period during which the productive forces are built up in preparation for an eventual communism.

Architectures for persistence

Abstract Persistent object oriented architectures have been researched for many years, deriving initially from the Manchester University Atlas machine. In reality, however, few actual implementations of persistent architectures exist. In the first half of this paper an examination of four well known designs is carried out, namely the System/38, Monads, Mutabor and the Rekursiv. Each machines object management model is explained, along with an analysis of the design decisions made. Following this, a discussion concerning the ideal persistent architecture is presented, suggesting design decision which should be considered in any future persistent architecture.