Guidance Note of the Secretary-General on Racial Discrimination and Protection of Minorities  •  9 7. Address institutional racism and systemic discrimination 22. There is a need for the UN system to engage with institutions that play a key role in interacting with persons belonging to minorities, including in order to combat institutional racism. Institutional racism can be a problem in a range of contexts, from educational and health institutions to institutions of criminal justice. For example, systemic discriminatory practices against minorities are frequently reported in law enforcement. In many countries there is evidence of over-representation of minorities in the criminal justice system, in particular in detention or prison, and minorities, including minority women, often face particular difficulties receiving proper legal assist­ ance and accessing justice. In many cases, minorities also face systemic discrimination in access to civil registration and identity documentation, which may put them at risk of statelessness. Labour market processes, practices and institutions may also generate and reinforce the cycle of discrimination. The UN must make consolidated and integrated efforts to support and empower reforms of the relevant institutions with a view to advancing minority participation and full equality before the law without any discrimination. 8. Pursue evidence-based actions and policies 23. Combating racial discrimination and advancing minority rights requires evidence-based actions and policies. In addition to reviewing existing legislation and policies, collection of disaggregated data is instrumental, including to identify indirect discrimination and to target positive measures and other necessary action appropriately. Disaggregated data can be collected to monitor any increase and/or decrease in inequality for minorities. Such data collection can help to identify those that are the most marginalized, and to build a relationship with national statistical offices to determine what information is available and where support is needed to improve data collection. Therefore, the UN system should encourage pertinent data collection, including through the inclusion of related questions in the contexts of population censuses. Given the sensitive nature of the ethnicity-based data, it is essential that related data protection norms as well as the principle of self-identification are fully respected and good practices on how to pursue collection of disaggregated data in line with these principles are identified and shared. 9. Support constructive management of diversity to address identity-based tensions 24. Discrimination is often at the root of identity-related tensions. Such tensions have a potential to develop into crises that could ultimately lead to conflict, forced displacement and, in the worst cases, to atrocity crimes, including genocide. Understanding discrimination as a risk factor for these most serious of crimes allows for the identification of preventive measures in the short, medium and long term. Prevention measures need to be culturally attuned and focused on the most important risk factors that