How are spouses matched in The Giver?

Jonas's uniform, highly structured society is founded on the principles of Sameness and tightly controlled by the Committee of Elders. The Committee of Elders is responsible for making every significant decision in the community, which includes controlling the birthrate, matching spouses, organizing households, and deciding specific occupations for each citizen in the community. In Jonas's society, independence and human agency are virtually nonexistent. Citizens do not get to choose their spouses and must apply for a spouse. After applying for a spouse, the Committee of Elders carefully examines the citizen's personality traits and compatibility factors in order to choose the perfect, most compatible partner for them. The citizens have absolutely no say in who they marry and the Matching of Spouses is controlled by the Committee of Elders. Once a couple is matched, they are monitored for three years before they are allowed to apply for a child, which is also out of their control and chosen by the Committee of Elders.

In The Giver, everything is controlled, from what jobs the citizens have to how many children they can raise. One example of this is the ceremony called the Matching of Spouses. The Committee of Elders, who run the society, oversee these kinds of ceremonies. Just like they determine what job each twelve-year-old is best suited to, they also assign spouses. The Committee of Elders considers each person's personality, as well as "disposition, energy level, intelligence, and interests." A person can apply for a spouse, and it may take a long time before the Committee of Elders decides upon a suitable match. They want the husband and wife to complement each other.

Once a pair has been married and observed for three years, they may apply for children. They can be granted one male child and one female child, who are birthed by Birth Mothers.

In this society, citizens don't have choice, because the Committee fears that people will choose wrong. They cannot choose who they marry. Their spouse is assigned to them.

Why do elders choose your spouse in The Giver?

The Elders choose a spouse for you in order to ensure perfect family units.

In Jonas’s community, people do not create their own families.  A family unit in Jonas’s community is not the same as a family as we know it.  This is because the community wants to create what they call Sameness, which means that everyone in the community is as similar as possible.  There are many rules and regulations that have been established to make this happen.

Family units consist of a man, a woman, a boy, and a girl.  The family unit is created for the purpose of raising children, and dissolves as soon as the youngest child grows up.  Family units reinforce community values and rules. They are child-rearing and socialization units.

An adult applies for a spouse when he or she feels ready to create a family unit.  Spouses are matched based on compatibility, meaning that they will work together or fit together well.  This might be based on temperament, intelligence, and interest.  We learn that not everyone is given a spouse.

Most of the people on the night crew had not even been given spouses because they lacked, somehow, the essential capacity to connect to others, which was required for the creation of a family unit. (Ch. 1) 

The Matching of Spouses is given “weighty consideration” to ensure that the family unit will function well.  The spouses act as parents, and the main focus is on the children.  They are not in love or married like spouses are in our understanding.  Matches are monitored for three years.  Then the couple can apply for a child.  When the children grow up, the parents go to live with the Childless Adults. 

Jonas discusses the spouse situation with The Giver later, as part of his training.  The Giver tells him it is harder for the Receiver of Memory to have a spouse, because he will have to keep things from her.  Jonas realizes that he will not live with his parents forever. 

"As long as they're still working and contributing to the community, they'll go and live with the other Childless Adults. And they won't be part of my life anymore. (Ch. 16) 

Jonas realizes that he won’t even know when his parents are released, because he will have moved on with his life by then.  His parents won’t be together either.  Jonas comments that it “seems to work pretty well that way,” but he also liked the memory of a real family he saw. 

By having family units, the community keeps things stable.  There are no divorces.  There are no broken homes.  As long as the children are children, they will always have parents.  However, there is no emotional connection to their parents, and their parents have no connection with each other.  As soon as the children grow, everyone just goes on.

How are spouses selected for citizens in The Giver?

In The Giver, there is very little (or any, really) autonomy for citizens. Every single aspect of life is determined by committees, who claim to act in the best interest of the society as a whole rather than the individual. While this may sound idealistic, it has some very dark consequences, ranging from personal unhappiness and lack of fulfillment to untimely and unwarranted death.

Marriage is no different from every other major life event in terms of a committee’s oversight: it is chosen by people other than those entering into the marriage contract, and whether the couple loves each other is irrelevant. Marriages are determined by the Committee of Elders, who oversee the entire family unit. A person may apply for a spouse (giving the illusion of autonomy), but the process is taken over by the Committee of Elders after that. Although the matching is not random or done blindly—it does take into account each person’s interests, intelligence, and personality—it is still done without the input of either member of the couple. Once the couple has been matched, they must wait for a period of three years before they may apply for a child. Each family unit consists of a man, a woman, and a child of each gender.

How do Community citizens in The Giver find their spouses?

In the dystopian world of The Giver, citizens of the Community are assigned their spouses by the ruling body called the Committee of Elders. The committee chooses spouses through the Matching of Spouses, in which the committee uses criteria to determine who is to be paired with who. In the Matching of Spouses, the committee makes this determination by considering four factors. These four factors are interests, disposition, energy level, and intelligence. So, in this tightly-controlled world, people are not able to make organically fall in love but are instead assigned a partner through a governing body that they are not allowed to question. This aspect of Community life is yet another example of why Jonas eventually chooses to resist.