Shames was named a Purpose Prize Fellow in 2010 by Encore.org[1] for his work helping AIDS orphans and former child soldiers in Africa.
[3] Shames is the author of eleven photography book monographs and a zine, including: Stephen Shames: A Lifetime in Photography (Kehrer Verlag, 2024), Comrade Sisters: Women of the Black Panther Party (ACC Art Books, 2022) co-authored with Ericka Huggins,Stephen Shames, Une Retrospective (Maison de la Photographie Robert Doisneau de Gentilly), Power to the People: The World of the Black Panthers (Abrams, 2016), co-authored with Bobby Seale, Outside the Dream: Child Poverty in America (Aperture), Pursuing the Dream: What Helps Children and Their Families Succeed(Aperture), The Black Panthers (Aperture), Bronx Boys (University of Texas Press, 2014), Facing Race, Free to Grow, and Transforming Lives; Shames is the author of a zine Youth (Dashwood, 2023) and an electronic book Bronx Boys (FotoEvidence, 2011).
All of Shames' negatives and contact sheets, notes, and 1,000 prints are housed at the Dolph Briscoe Center for American History at the University of Texas, Austin.
[13] Senator Bill Bradley said about the work: “Just as Walker Evans’ photographs helped America see the poverty of Appalachia, the vivid images in Outside the Dream will open our hearts to the deprivation that today afflicts not a region, but an entire generation.”[14] In 1993, copies of Outside the Dream were distributed to every member of Congress, the governors of all 50 states, selected state legislators, and the chief executive officers of the Fortune 500 companies.
The work was published in 1997 as Pursuing the Dream: What Helps Children and Their Families Succeed and includes a preface by Michael Jordan.
… This book can inspire all of us to seek out the many opportunities already available in their own communities to make a difference in the lives of others.”[14] In 2006, Shames founded an NGO in Africa that locates forgotten children (AIDS orphans, former child soldiers, child laborers, and children living in internally displaced person camps) and molds them into leaders by sending them to the best schools and colleges.