Tourism and other kinds of local development have become important elements in generating employment in rural Ireland. Yet, despite a commitment to local participation and to gender auditing, women are typically under-represented in structures promoting tourism and other kinds of development at local level (Kearney, et al., 1995). Using documentary evidence, this paper first describes this phenomenon in one particular area (viz., Ballyhoura). Second, drawing on O'Connell's (1987) work, it suggests that this pattern reflects the subtle nature and limits of patriarchal control. Third, drawing on interview material with a sample of women who were individual shareholders in the Ballyhoura Failte Co-operative, it suggests that this control involves the selective obscuring of gender in particular contexts, and the selective discounting of the structural realities of power and money. Finally, the article highlights those factors which play a part in modifying some of the consequences, but not the consensual reality, of such control.