“The famine started the exodus more than a century ago. Is the racial (sic) memory of it still continuing it? Has it set up some unfathomed psychosis deep down in the Celtic psyche which fills the heart of the Gael with an insatiable restlessness, a cosmic wanderlust, a sort of demi‐urge that goads him to the waiting ship and far‐distant shore?”SummaryON THE CAUSES OF IRISH EMIGRATIONIn this paper several generally accepted reasons for Irish emigration (population density, poor marriage prospects for females and internal family pressures) will be rejected. Today's emigration has its own structure and its own contemporary causes. It is argued that emigrating is not any longer final in character, but can better be described as migrant labour. On the basis of a statistical analysis and the results of sociological fieldwork in a rural trade centre in S. W. Ireland it is shown that economic factors and the standard motive of adventure are most important in explaining why the Irish emigrate nowadays. The relation between these two types of factors is one between necessary and sufficient conditions.RésuméCet article réfute plusieurs des causes généralement acceptées de l'émigration irlandaise (densité démographique, espérance de mariage faible pour les jeunes filles et pressions familiales). L'émigration actuelle a ses propres structures et ses causes spkcifiques. L'auteur dtmontre que l'émigration ne présente plus un caractère définitif mais constitue une migration temporaire de travail. Des analyses statistiques et une recherche sociologique menée dam une ville située dans une zone rurale du sud‐ouest de l'Irlande, ont montré que les facteurs économiques et l'aspiration classique è l'aventure constituent des facteurs trés importants des migrations irlandaises actuelles. La relation entre ces deux types de motivations est une entre conditions ntcessaires et suffisantes de la migration.LES CA