Service-Learning: A Luxury Reserved for the Powerful?

Is service-learning merely a nicety, an extra-curricular activity reserved for those with the luxury of spare time? The luxury of spare time often correlates with power, constituted by affluence and influence. Is it then that service-learning is the tool of those with power, set over and against the marginalized? As such, do the claims of service-learning theorists and practitioners to promote justice and reciprocity ring hollow with the vacuous tones of hypocrisy? I think these are questions any service-learning practitioner must face, and do so with the real possibility that the answers could draw into question some some of the basic foundations concerning one's interactions with the world. If we cannot question the very motivations and meanings latent within the radical practice of service-learning that we advocate for, then what substantial benefit can we possibly have?