> Overall the medieval era was something of a setback in the aggregate if you look at social development overall in the western core I'm not especially fond of

> Overall the medieval era was something of a setback in the aggregate if you look at social development overall in the western core I'm not especially fond of the world system theory and I'm extremely wary of the concept of core countries but even if we accept for a minute that it makes sense, there is a very simple explanation to that in the theory: western countries which now form the core weren't part of it at the time.