Carceral moderation and the Janus face of international pressure
53
to contravene both ECHR obligations and broader international human rights legislation. With regard to immigration detention conditions as such, the international realm
has even practically operated as a driver of Greek non-compliance with the ECHR,
insofar as the EU has effectively fuelled overcrowding and associated problems, not
least by continuing to channel large flows of irregular migration to Greece.
In sum, contrary to concerns that have been raised in scholarship on the effectiveness
of international human rights regimes about the validity of causal attribution per se, our
account coheres with, and provides further validation to, approaches to causation which
argue not only that the identification of causal factors is a legitimate endeavour, but also
that different causal factors may be inextricably bound together in a relationship of
mutual constitution and cumulative efficacy (see, e.g., [85]). What this implies is that
efforts to explain national propensity towards compliance with an international human
rights regime need to extend beyond considering single sets of variables (e.g., domestic
capacity limitations), just as they need to extend beyond considering single variables
within given sets (e.g., pro-compliance international pressures). In so doing, moreover,
the possibility needs to be considered that different variables within a particular set may
exert opposing and even counter-productive effects, as our account of both pro- and
counter-compliance influences stemming from the international sphere reveals.
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