Reclaiming monetary sovereignty: CBDCs, infrastructural power, and the reconfiguration of the international monetary system

Purpose This study aims to explore how central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) reshape the geopolitics of monetary sovereignty by shifting authority from private-led to state-driven payment infrastructures. It argues that sovereignty in monetary affairs must be understood not only as the legal prerogative to issue currency but also as control over the technological and institutional systems that underpin cross-border payments and settlements. Design/methodology/approach The study analyses two cases: the Bank for International Settlements Innovation Hub’s mBridge project and the embryonic, largely symbolic BRICS Cross-Border Payments Initiative. It builds on scholarship in currency hierarchies and infrastructural geopolitics to assess how these proposals may transform the geopolitical dynamics of payment infrastructures. Findings The cases show that CBDCs can incrementally reconfigure power within an international monetary system long anchored in US dollar dominance and Western-centric private utilities such as the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication, the New York Clearing House Interbank Payments System and Continuous Linked Settlement. mBridge demonstrates how public governance can be embedded directly into code, contracts and consensus protocols, while BRICS highlights the symbolic projection of infrastructural autonomy. Research limitations/implications The findings suggest that although CBDCs can expand monetary sovereignty through infrastructural redesign, they also expose persistent structural constraints within the international monetary system. Moreover, US dollar dominance may be deeply connected to factors beyond payment infrastructures, such as global liquidity provision, the depth of US financial markets and strong network effects, which CBDCs alone may not overcome. Originality/value The study contributes by demonstrating that CBDCs function as infrastructural interventions with potential implications for geopolitics, while also linking debates on technological design to broader questions of monetary sovereignty.