What if your bootstraps are broken?

This week in class, we aim to discuss whether class position and mobility are directly linked to indivual acheivement and self sufficency, or to institutionalized policy and structures. The author's of this week's readings all address this question in their own voices, using their own examples. However, Dalton struck me with one sentiment.

“If there is a genuine commitment to merit- based decision making it is possible that merit will out, but only for those that have the right kind of merit.” (306)

In his discussion regarding the myth of the ability of an individual to rise through the ranks of class based on their own merit and the judgement thereof, Dalton raises many important questions for the marginalized and oppressed populations.

What is merit? How do we define it? Who decides which merits are valued? How do these decisions effect other people? What is the role of personal biases and experiences? What is the role of individual anomalies(ie Colin Powell) in the greater culture conversation?

While I do not venture to say that I have all of the answers to these questions, there are certainly aspects I can try and dismantle. If I were to take the stance that class position and mobility were individual- then I would support at least in part, that one could pull themselves up by their own boot straps and make meaningful changes which would advance them up the class ladder. It would be their own work, their own savings, their own cultural and social capital, that would be their tools in designing their own success. But.. What if your bootstraps are broken?
It is not that an individual with broken bootstraps wants to advance any less then those with perfectly new "footwear". In fact, it could be argued that those with broken bootstraps want even more desparately to advance, for if they advance then they can have the money, and the job, to afford them new shoes and make their journeys easier. If we remain in this context, lets consider what if your boots are hand me downs? Or if your government, school, clothing company, no longer carries the bootstraps made for people like you(ie in your size) What is one to do then?
It is in this vein that I can only begin to question the role of systems and institutions in the role of individual advancement.
I find it narrow and ignorant to devisively paint class in this binary manner. On the whole I have made a life's purpose out of institutional frameworks. Though not mutually exclusive.
I dont think any of this weeks authors have comprehensively and successfully negotiated the two simultaneously. In that, an individual does hold a role within a system, such as an individual does have postition to make meaning of their class, participate in changes however small to the class system, and to negotiate their class or other identities to the best that they are able within the larger context. However, when we do not consider policy and procedure of systems, then we cannot adeptly address the questions that arise when one individual, with all the "right" merits is denied opportunities to advance simply by basis of an immutable characteristic. When one has reached the glass ceiling for those of their identities- who do we blame the glass ceiling on? When one has pulled themselves up by their bootstraps to find themselves only at an iron clad sign of do not enter then what?