Unironically yes. The development in the imperial core came at the expense of the rest of the world, that’s what the term is referring to, the part of the world economy that is accumulating through imperialism the wealth and resources of the whole planet.
Can you explain why some of the nordic countries, i.e. Norway, Sweden, Denmark are part of the imperial core while Finland, Iceland, Greenland are not? I can put color on a white map too, doesn’t mean it portrays a real issue adequately. Also wtf, why is Portugal not part of the imperial core?
The map is a reference to the one you see whenever just about any international issue comes up and the same crew are all in agreement, I’m not actually positive what specific issue this map was taken from.
The website has a more serious explainer (with a couple versions of the map) but I’m with you, Iceland and Portugal and Finland are core countries probably. The real answer is that it’s fluid and historically contingent, not set in stone. It’s a question of how your economy develops and how it relates to ‘peripheral’ countries that are primarily extracted from, not a literal list pulled off an emoji.
I looked through that article and found it somewhat problematic. Especially the description of core countries as:
They have strong state institutions, a powerful military and powerful global political alliances.
For example, Iceland does not even have a military, but can still be part of capitalist neo-colonialism as part of the “imperial core”. Even so, one should also keep in mind that Iceland historically had been under Denmark’s dominion and it is wrong to say that it has been a primary benefactor of classic colonialism leading to the rise of western powers in modern history. On the other hand, Portugal has been a strong colonial power historically. Still, the development index of Iceland is way higher and I would argue there are lots of factors in play as to why, and one cannot say that there is a direct equivalence between development index and imperialism. Both Norway, Iceland and Finland gained independence in the 20th century, never had proper colonies and are part of the economic elite. Norway is still in large an economy based around export of natural resources, which is atypical for being an imperial core member. I often feel that many facts like these are overlooked in discussions of imperial cores in favor of simplistic ideas such as equivocating HDI and imperialism. Can we not have better discussions around the mechanics of modern imperialism than throwing around a map and calling out people for not being intimate with the idea of an imperial core, an idea whose simplicity makes itself highly flawed?