Reforming criminal justice -- including reducing reliance on incarceration and harsh punishment -- is one focus area of the Open Society Institute's (OSI) new Criminal Justice Fund, part of a new $75-million funding commitment.

The goal of the expanded U.S. program at OSI will be to promote equality, ensure government transparency, and reform criminal-justice and national-security policies. In addition to the Criminal Justice Fund -- which also will work to improve the administration of justice -- OSI has established a Transparency and Integrity Fund, and Equality and Opportunity Fund (supporting communities of color, immigrants, women, and the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community), and a Democracy and Power Fund.

New, three-year program initiatives announced by OSI include Black Male Achievement, which will work to confront stigmatization, criminalization, and exclusion of African-American men and boys from the economic and political mainstream; and National Security and Human Rights, focusing on U.S. policies on torture, surveillance, arbitrary detention, and racial profiling.