Within the last thirty years in developed countries of the world, and in Croatia, there has been an effort to educate children with developmental difficulties in regular schools, together with the children not suffering from such problems, in order to prepare them for living together later in life. In Croatia it is usually called integration in education. In this work the author first deals with the reasons initiating these ideas, i.e, the most important factors which influenced their appearance, the scientific knowledge justifying their existence and realization, and their introduction in different countries as well as means of implementation. Furthermore, a survey of elaborated expectations in literature is given and the doubts connected with the problem of more successful socialization of such children in the integrated conditions of schooling. The justification of these expectations and doubts has been illustrated with a comprehensive survey of works presenting the results of research of this issue worldwide and in Croatia. These results indicate that integration does not help realize the aim it was introduced for: to achieve successful socialization of children with developmental difficulties. What follows is a survey of works presenting the perspectives of a more successful integration in education, outlining the determinants for the future of such practice in Croatia.
