problems, and focusing on the minutiae of cases in an inquisitorial forum, monitoring leaves detention uncontested. It is time for the informal pact of silence between the police and the authority to be broken; only by doing so will monitors be able to follow their actual mandate to protect the rights of people deprived of their liberty and ensure that they can prevent their mistreatment. Whether, they can challenge institutions of confinement, though, is highly debatable. As Foucault put it, ‘the real political task in a society such as ours is to criticize the working of institutions which appear to be both neutral and independent; to criticize them in such a manner that the political violence which has always exercised itself obscurely through them will be unmasked, so that one can fight them.’98 By exposing the political violence inherent in the work of the NPM, I have shown how their mere existence can provide an alibi to the state for continuing their violence work unperturbed. Instead of making the system more just, this, risks spreading an unjust system to more people (Ben-Moshe, 2020) Conclusion This chapter has dealt with one question. What explains the sheer disregard of human life inside Greek detention centres that was revealed in previous chapters? In answering this question, I have documented the relationship between the culture of violence inside immigration detention centres and those institutions that are supposed to prevent such experiences, protect those under their powers and investigate and punish the perpetrators of such harms. In exploring these relationships, I have identified a series of processes that have functioned to protect, legitimise and exonerate the Greek detention system in three ways. First, by making the police the central actor inside detention, the Greek state showed from very early on the direction and nature of detention: It is a repressive, militarised system that seeks to function as a security blanket for scared and unsafe citizens. However, by subcontracting the management of detention to an overwhelmed and underpaid police force, that has knowingly strong alliances to the ultra-right, the Greek state has further shown that they prefer having uncontrollable racist police than face the responsibilities that come with dealing with an increasingly growing migrant population. 98 Foucault, in Human Nature, at 171 {as cited by The Foucault Reader 6 (Paul Rabinow ed., 1984)). 149