This report presents the findings of one segment of a larger research project being carried out by members of the Geography Department at St. Patrick's College, Maynooth. (This research project, entitled 'Rural development strategies in the West of Ireland', and funded by the National Board for Science and Technology, has as its focus the actual and potential role of both state agencies and locally-based groups in promoting rural development/ A number of study areas have been selected within which in-depth examinations are being conducted of the contribution to development being made by both types of approach. The study area which is the subject of this report was chosen because of the existence within it of a particularly vigorous framework of locally-based development which could be set against state-sponsored development policies and measures in the same area.