The election of a series of leftist presidents across Latin America brought hope of alternative models of development, and a greater say for civil society organisations. Instead social actors have been marginalised – even criminalised – by ‘progressive’ governments that have continued to rely on extractive industries to fund social programmes. Ecuador’ s Y asuní-ITT , which emerged from civil society, was seen as a possible model of ‘post-oil’ development. Adopted by the government of President Correa, its cancellation resulted in strong opposition from a new social actor: urban young people, styling themselves Yasunídos (United for Yasuní). This article contends that this surprising outcome can only be understood by reference to the development education (DE) programme organised by environmental non-governmental organisations (NGOs). The case of Yasunídos demonstrates the potential for using Freirean pedagogy to construct civil society responses to this new context.