The EU is often described as a sui generis international organization. While this is an apt description in some ways, it is far from self-evident that the special features that the EU exhibits are or should be part of the explanation of why and how it is bound by customary international law. This chapter seeks to show that, in the eye of public international law, the EU is not yet in a category of its own which would justify or otherwise affect the applicability of custom to it. It does so by investigating whether a special category of ‘regional economic integration organizations’ (REIOs) has emerged to which international law grants ‘preferential’ treatment, with a focus on three rules that were unsuccessfully proposed to cater for the specificities of the EU in codification projects carried out by the UN International Law Commission. The chapter also considers doctrinal and normative reasons why calls to distinguish the EU from other international organizations under customary international law have fallen on deaf ears, while recognizing the role that the EU has played in widening the horizons of the law of international organizations.

The EU functions as a receptor and promoter of customary international law (CIL). However, from a theoretical (and international law) perspective, the questions why and when the EU is bound by CIL still have not been answered in definite terms. This chapter argues that the EU should be afforded a similar treatment as is afforded to (newly independent) states. This is based on a close examination of its practice in the field of international humanitarian law (IHL), where the primary organization tasked with ensuring peace and security – the United Nations – has so far avoided explicitly affirming that it is bound by customary IHL. After showing that it is indeed the EU which might bear direct responsibility in the context of military operations authorized under the Common Security and Defence Policy, the chapter examines the EU’s behaviour when it comes to new regulatory efforts, its executive and operational conduct, and the CJEU’s case law. On the basis thereof, it is concluded that the EU’s practice confirms the theoretical conclusions reached, and that therefore any theoretical uncertainties on whether and why international organizations are bound by CIL might in future be answered by paying closer attention to their practice.

Chapter Two is the first of four chapters on Athenian drama, and it takes as its focal point Aeschylus’ Prometheus Bound. In this chapter, I observe that the representation of the maiden Io as a wild and erratic dancer engages with images of female choreia and the precarious position of the outstanding maiden soloist that originate in Archaic poetry but develop a special force within Athenian tragedy. Building on arguments developed in Chapter One, I explore how the image of the maiden chorus creates space for the female soloist to relate positively to her choral group, and then demonstrate that Io disrupts that paradigm by appearing utterly unmoored from any sense of chorality. I argue that Io embodies the play’s vision of mortal life and offers an image of resistance to the authority of Zeus distinct from the static suffering of Prometheus himself – a resistance that is grounded in the twin forces of mobility and maternity.