At a driving distance from Dublin of about five hours, it takes as long to get to Kilbaha on the Loop Head peninsula in Co Clare as it does to fly across the Atlantic. For an area which has traditionally sent more of its share of emigrants to the US, there is an irony that people are discovering the pleasure and pain of living in an area which, while offering little materially, has always inspired fierce loyalties.

During the past decade more than 400 families, usually unemployed and with little to lose, opted to leave city life, transferring their social welfare payments to a rural post office. "What they see is a house surrounded by grass. That is the dream. They assume this is going to be the countryside. Freedom, space around them, a place to leave the kids out," says Jim Connolly, founder of the movement.

Before he made Kilbaha famous as the headquarters for Rural Resettlement Ireland (RRI), it was known for the Little Ark, a simple wooden altar on wheels, used in the 1850s for saying Mass on the foreshore where the landlord had no power. But the resilience of the locals has not prevented a steady population decline as farming practices make small holdings uneconomical. "It was the area in west Clare in most serious decline, without a shadow of a doubt," Jim Connolly says.

"As a direct result of Rural Resettlement, and it is only a small area, there are 10 new houses with 10 new families, seven being rented from the local authority and three which are private."

He says the real struggle takes place around schools, where communities regenerate themselves. "If you lose a school, the heart of the community is gone." The germ of the scheme was to shift the focus away from jobs and towards living. "At that time there was no Celtic Tiger, no talk of it - and generations of people had been unemployed, if you like. And then it struck me that maybe these people could move on the same dole, on the same income they were used to living on anyway, but changing the quality of life out of all proportion. In other words, unemployment was the key, not employment."

Since 1991, 431 families have made the move, mostly from Dublin; but 67 travelled from areas in Britain and Northern Ireland, and five have made the move from Cork. With an 80 per cent success rate, 345 families have put down roots in all the western counties, populating them with more than 700 children, availing of generous pupil-teacher ratios in many cases and, often, saving primary schools from closure.

Having transport is an essential, and Connolly was critical of the introduction of the National Car Test, believing it would drive low-income families off the road. For those who can afford a car, a half-hour's journey will put a family well in range of a village or town.

Apart from elements of country living now valued, the isolation and the peace, there are some lingering aspects of yesteryear. It's not quite leaving your doors unlocked at night - but Connolly is amused by Dublin visitors who invariably lock their cars outside his cottage in Kilbaha. He talks of kids tearing to school on bikes, throwing them against a wall, knowing they will be there when they return. "To city people, that is unreal."

For those who moved, the change has sometimes brought jobs, particularly in recent years. In west Clare, one resettled person runs a driving school, another a mobile dog-grooming service. One trained butcher got a job in a local supermarket. A sculptor by profession, Jim Connolly has had a mixed career, playing a trumpet in the showband era, doing pub gigs, teaching art, being chairman of RRI and, now, at the age of 63, returning to a more active role as full-time administrator of the programme which is assisted by the American Ireland Fund.

The RRI's brochure bleakly predicts that a further 30,000 to 40,000 small farmers will disappear from the rural landscape; but thousands of families could be resettled "to redress this depopulation trend". This is Connolly's vision. "I believe it should be looked upon now as a social experiment that has gone on for 10 years, carried on by a voluntary group with some Government support, and that there are lessons to be learnt.

"Whereas we have moved hundreds of families, I believe it could become thousands and thousands of families if it was supported with an official policy, properly resourced, grantaided, with special housing programmes built in. It would be part of a national solution to a national problem.

"And the national problem quite simply is, over-population on the east coast."