The emergence and proliferation of black brotherhoods was directly linked to the growth of the slave population and that of freedmen, along with the need for catechization, implicit in the colonial project. Another contributing factor, which was also encountered in Iberian lands, was the increasing interest in these institutions among slaves and freedmen. Based on the wills of freedmen and freedwomen in Salvador, Kátia Matoso (1982) and Inês de Oliveria (1998) found that between the years 1790 and 1830, only 21.6 per cent of the freedmen and 18.5 per cent of the freedwomen who left wills did not belong to brotherhoods. The majority belonged to more than one, and many to three, four, five or more brotherhoods. This interest certainly stemmed from the material and spiritual support offered by these groups, as was true of brotherhoods in general, but perhaps even more so in the case of the black brotherhoods (Reis, 1991, pp. 206-09; Delfino 2017, pp. 318-24).  
These brotherhoods were generally managed by an administrative board, divided hierarchically into several positions according to specific functions. In the context of a slave society, the unparalleled possibility of managing funds raised among the brothers or through alms certainly mobilized slaves, freedmen and free people of colour to join a brotherhood or even aspire to hold one of the management positions. There are records of fierce disputes over the issue of positions on the brotherhoods' boards, involving black brothers but also members of the white population (Reis, 1997, pp. 7-33). Until the midseventeenth century, the roles of treasurer and clerk were usually occupied by white men. However, from the eighteenth century onwards, both in Portuguese America and metropolitan Portugal, men of colour were gradually winning the right to these prestigious roles (Reginaldo, 2011, pp. 178-80).