Elena Nikolova is an Associate Professor at Zayed University in the UAE and has an extensive background in policy work for international organizations such as the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the International Monetary Fund, the United Nations Development Programme, the African Development Bank, the World Bank, the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, and the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia. She has worked across Eastern Europe, Asia, and Africa.
Prior to her current position, she served as an Assistant Professor in Economics at University College London and worked as an economist at the EBRD in London. She earned her PhD from Princeton University in 2011 and her undergraduate degree from Gettysburg College in the US. Her research spans gender economics, labor, social and economic development, entrepreneurship, political economy, economic history, and the politics and economics of development and transition.
