Abstract
從1980年代末起，多層次傳銷在臺灣已逐漸成為一種重要的社會現象。本 論文嘗試探討臺灣傳銷商的一些重要的特質，以及這些特質的成因。本論 文以Goffman的「表演」（performance）為理論的工具，以實地的田野參 予觀察法，配合上傳銷場域中大量的見證及訓練課程的錄音帶資料來分析 。研究發現，傳銷商最重要的特質，主要來自於傳銷吸收下線這個基本的 工作性質；這種工作性質預設了傳銷商在吸收下線的過程中，必須在下線 面前「表演」出特定的特質；在本論文中區分文「希望的表演」、「相信 的表演」、「愛與關懷的表演」三大型式的表演。傳銷商的這三種型式的 表演，最終都將成為傳銷商本身的特質。這主要是由兩種原因所造成的。 第一是傳銷事業運作的結果，會讓傳銷組織具有類似於「全控機構」那種 封閉性的特質，這種特質有助於傳銷商全面地內化這三種表演的特質。第 二個原因是傳銷商在「相信的表演」的過程中，為了取信於下線，因此必 須動員自己所有的可能，讓自己相信傳銷事業所預設的一切特質的這種動 力所造成的。在結論部份嘗試與Goffman 的「表演」與社會學「全控機構 」兩個概念做對話，並暗示這種傳銷商「主體」建立的過程在整個資本主 義發展歷史中具有什麼開創性的意涵。 Since late 1980, Multi-level Distributorship(M.L.D.) have gradually become an important social phenomenon in Taiwan . This paper tries to discuss the important character of the distributors and the reasons of the character formed. This paper uses Goffman's "performance" as a theoretical tool, and by the method of participate-observe-in-field, with a large amount of records of witnesses and training courses as sources of analysis. This paper find that the most important character comes from the basic working requirment of recruiting downlines. This requirement means in the process of recruiting, distributor must "perform" some predestinated characters in front of the downline. In this paper, these performances are classified into three types : the performance of hope, belief and love. The three performance types of distributors would at last be the character of distributors their selves. This has two causes. First, the M.L.D. have the character of closeness like "Total Institution". The character of closeness contributes to the distributor's accepteness of the contents of performence. Second, in the process of performance of belief, in order to make downlines believe, distributors must do their best to make their selves believe all character of M.L.D.. And at last they do believe. In conclusion, I try to feedback Goffman's theory of performance and the concept of "total institution" in sociology. At last I implicitly suggest the meaning in the histioy of capitalism of the subject of the distributors formed.