Is the development of "developing countries" evidence against the idea that former colonial powers owe their headway to exploitation? There is a recurring narrative (especially but not exclusively in left-leaning circles) that today's "developed nations", particularly Western former colonial powers, owe much of their wealth and progress to the exploitation of their former colonies. This is frequently used to counter the idea that the "First World's" headway is due to any inherent superiority, either in culture or social organization (such as capitalism, market liberalism or democracy). The implication, apart from the call for reparations that often follows, is that today's "developing nations" are unlikely to ever catch up, replacing the idea of global progress with one of eternal injustice (barring a revolution, which of course is what many proponents of this narrative are aiming for).
However, to my untrained eye, the current development of many "developing countries" seems to falsify this idea. Is that so? I assume some work has been done on this -- can anyone here point me in the right direction? That would be greatly appreciated.
The recent development of many "developing countries" and "emerging markets" does not mean that Western colonial powers did not exploit them in the past.

Emerging economies owe their modern GDP growth to cheap labor, as (former) Western colonial powers switched their (expensive) manufacturing bases to countries like China, India, etc. In the past, they were exploited mainly for their natural resources moreso than labor.

The continued GDP growth of Western colonial powers is due to a shift from manufacturing (labor-intensive, low-education professions) to "high tech" industries which require significantly more education (medical research, computer programming, etc.).

The book "Capital" by Thomas Piketty has a far more detailed history of how capital flows shifted from the 18th century to modern times, and the economic interplay between Western colonial powers and the developing nations. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_in_the_Twenty-First_Century