The transition taking place within the Dutch healthcare system has been a central theme in politics and public debate for decades. The recent changes again demand the full attention of researchers and educators in the field. In this article, we reflect on the current ideology and goals of the transition and link these to the range of ideas that lie behind the ideal of “community care”. Additionally, we pose the question of what these changes may mean for research and education within the social care domain in general and for our research group in particular. The AUAS Community Care Research Group covers a variety of research topics that are clustered into three “streams”: informal care, social inclusion and network strengthening. Within these streams, we focus on care by society and link this to professional caregiving. We will also explain why our research interests are specifically relevant in the context of the transition of the healthcare system, as this transition explicitly accentuates the importance of a “caring society” and thus a change in role for the care professional. We will also reflect on how we can best translate our research results into the curriculum of education programmes for students who will soon work as professionals in the social and/or care domains.