Valeriya Mechkova (*1989) is a Researcher at the Varieties of Democracy (V-Dem) Institute, and PhD candidate at the Department of Political Science, University of Gothenburg. She is currently a team leader on a USAID funded project to analyze democracy, governance and human rights with the V-Dem data, and has previously worked as a consultant for the World Bank, Community of Democracies and International IDEA. She has published scholarly articles in Democratization, Journal of Democracy, Political Research Quarterly among others. Valeriya is also working part-time with the policy and outreach program of the V-Dem Institute. In particular, she is leading the work of the V-Dem input to the Post-2015 development agenda and measurement of Sustainable Development Goal 16. Previously she worked as V-Dem’s analyst and data operations manager, starting from May 2013 until August 2016. Valeriya holds a M.Sc. degree in International Administration and Global Governance from University of Gothenburg.