As you may have heard, Venezuela's economy is in trouble. State price controls, intended to protect the poor from soaring inflation, have helped create shortages of basic consumer goods like butter, coffee, and milk -- and the problem is exacerbated by foreign exchange controls that have left importers without scarce dollars to import goods. The good news: There are a few signs that new President Nicolás Maduro knows he has to take constructive action. The bad news: Early signs are that reform will prove too timid to make a difference -- and could be reversed with little warning.

Maduro emerged from his April election victory politically weak, which may explain why he hasn't deviated much from mentor Hugo Chávez's playbook. He has the same allies and enemies as Chávez, who both championed millions of disenfranchised Venezuelans and ran his country's economy into the ground. And if Maduro lacks Chávez's theatrical flair, he has clearly memorized much of the Chávez script. The country's problems, his government claims, are an illusion created by foreign powers bent on discrediting the country's Bolivarian revolution.

But Chávez is gone, and Maduro is struggling to explain why the country is now running out of toilet paper.

To try to stop the bleeding, the government has increased prices on a number of staple goods by 20 percent, to encourage production and help resolve shortages after the scarcity index reached an all-time high in April. In addition, Finance Minister Nelson Merentes announced last week that the government will expedite the disbursement of dollars via the country's central currency authority, and the government announced plans for additional auctions through a new system designed to give companies that import food and medicine an opportunity to buy dollars at a lower price.

But these are baby steps. A 20 percent hike at a time of 30 percent inflation suggests the government isn't serious about the need for real reform, and the new schemes to ease dollar allocation can't by themselves resolve the country's foreign exchange distortions.

Worryingly, the tepid policy response may be a sign of deep divisions within the administration and Maduro's inability to commit to a coherent economic strategy. The new president seems torn between more pragmatic advisors, like Merentes and Oil Minister Rafael Ramírez, and a more ideological faction led by Planning Minister Jorge Giordani, Central Bank President Edmée Betancourt, and Vice President Jorge Arreaza. Until the president commits to a course, policymaking will probably remain erratic and consist mainly of near-term crisis management.

There are a few encouraging signs of realism from the government. Talks between Maduro and billionaire businessman Lorenzo Mendoza and outreach from Finance Ministry officials to other private-sector players suggest Chávez's successor understands that he can't simply saber-rattle his country toward prosperity. There are even signs that Maduro wants to improve relations with the evil empire across the gulf.

But the Chavistas have played this game before, and it's reasonable to wonder how Maduro's government will respond if things get worse and Venezuelans begin pouring into the streets. We shouldn't be surprised if he again turns to familiar friends and reliable enemies -- both at home and abroad.

In the meantime, the government just ordered another 50 million rolls of toilet paper.

Risa Grais-Targow is an analyst in Eurasia Group's Latin America practice. Willis Sparks is director in the firm's global macro practice.

Eurasia Group's weekly selection of essential reading for the political-risk junkie -- presented in no particular order. As always, feel free to give us your feedback or selections by tweeting at us via @EurasiaGroup or @ianbremmer.

Must-reads

"Leaving Bangladesh? Not an Easy Choice for Brands"
Jonathan Fahey and Anne D'Innocenzio, Associated Press
The recent tragedy in Bangladesh is a reason for multinationals to take their business elsewhere. The average hourly wage of 24 cents in Bangladesh (compared to $0.45 in Cambodia, $0.52 in Pakistan, $0.53 in Vietnam, or $1.26 in China) may prove sufficient reason to stay.

"Making a hash of finding the cash"
Economist
Why is it so hard to recover assets from former leaders who pilfered their countries while in power?

"Pakistan's next prime minister wants to end decades-old feud with India"
Jon Boone, Jason Burke, and Emma Graham-Harrison, Guardian
Last weekend, Nawaz Sharif became set to be prime minister in a resounding victory that was the first peaceful transfer of power from one civilian government to another in Pakistan's 66-year history. Do Sharif's decisive win and conservative credentials allow him to promote greater economic collaboration with India?

"Erdogan's Great Gamble"
John Hannah, Foreign Policy
Is a watershed agreement with Turkey's Kurds the next big step for Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan? Or will a political challenge as old as the Turkish state itself prove too difficult to meet?

"The Ayatollah's Game Plan"
Mohsen Milani, Foreign Affairs
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei may not be able to simply choose Iran's next president -- but he can influence the outcome of the upcoming presidential election in many ways.

Must-view
"The Rescue of Jessica Buchanan"
60 Minutes
This 15-minute TV segment tells the story of Jessica Buchanan's abduction in Somalia and eventual rescue by a Navy SEAL team.

Must-play
Do you have an interest in geography -- or procrastination? Via Google Maps, Geoguessr drops you at a random point in the world; you guess your location based on your surroundings and get points for proximity.

Eurasia Group's weekly selection of essential reading for the political risk junkie -- presented in no particular order. As always, feel free to give us your feedback or selections @EurasiaGroup or @ianbremmer.

Must-reads

"U.S. Blames China's Military Directly for Cyberattacks"
David E. Sanger, New York Times
For the first time, Barack Obama's administration explicitly accused China's military of responsibility for cyberattacks on U.S. government computer systems. By some estimates, 90 percent of the cyber-espionage in the United States originates in China.

"Russia's Energy Bully Takes a Fall"
Alexandros Petersen, Foreign Policy
Is Russia's coercive use of natural gas exports to bully its neighbors finally unraveling? Will cheaper gas worldwide exacerbate Russia's "reverse dependence" on European markets?

"Japan's leading exporters say the weak yen is helping them, to a point"
Gwynn Guilford, Quartz
Is Abenomics for real? It certainly had an impact on many exporters' first-quarter bottom line. The weaker yen accounted for 43.2 billion yen of Nissan's 174.4 billion yen operating profit (up almost 50 percent from the same period last year).

"In China, Power Is Arrogant"
Yu Hua, New York Times
In 2001, hospital officials in Shenzhen stipulated that nurses should "show precisely eight teeth when smiling." This piece addresses the "wacky and arbitrary nature" of many Chinese regulations.

"This Is The World's First Entirely 3D-Printed Gun"
Andy Greenberg, Forbes
What happens when rapidly evolving technologies meet an age-old political debate? Twenty-five-year-old Cody Wilson is utilizing 3-D printers to print guns -- and is sharing the blueprints in downloadable open-source format on his website in a bid to undermine gun control efforts. Here is a disturbing documentary from Vice on the process and its implications.

International efforts to limit Somali piracy are having some effect, with the story dropping out of the headlines over the past year. In the first three months of this year, there were only five attempts and only one successful hijacking (a fishing vessel), according to the latest quarterly report from the International Maritime Bureau. This is a far cry from 2008, when piracy off the Somali coast resulted in 28 hijackings amid 237 attempts. The economic impact of piracy is considerable. The World Bank in April calculated that between $315 million and $385 million has been paid in ransoms to Somali pirates since 2005, though that pales in comparison with the estimated $18 billion that piracy costs the world economy each year.

The apparent success in limiting piracy in the Gulf of Aden raises the question of whether the tactics used there will work in other hot spots, such as the Gulf of Guinea, where piracy directed at oil tankers and other vessels is booming. The short answer is no; in fact, the tactics being used off the coast of Somalia are unlikely to have a permanent impact by themselves. The drop in reported attacks is largely due to three factors: multinational naval and aerial initiatives, private armed security guards, and improved preventive measures used by the crews of merchant vessels. For example, all five unsuccessful attempts were deterred by private armed security guards who fired warning shots, while a naval vessel quickly came to the aid of the one successfully hijacked ship.

There has been little effort to attack the root causes of piracy, however. That realization implies that should any of the current efforts to combat piracy be eliminated or constrained -- such as a reduction in the international naval presence and aerial surveillance -- the number of attacks could quickly rise to earlier levels. A European naval mission, Atalanta, is slated to end in December 2014, having already been extended once. Rising interest in the region from Asian and Middle Eastern powers could help replace any reduction in European assistance. The failure to address on-the-ground issues in Somalia is understandable as the country has not had a coherent government for much of the past two decades. However, the lack of domestic capacity to address the issue -- a key ingredient in the successful reduction of piracy in the Strait of Malacca by Indonesia, Singapore, and Malaysia -- has yet to be addressed and leaves continued success reliant on international initiatives.

One attempt to resolve this weakness has been the controversial formation of the Puntland Maritime Police Force to combat piracy from the land, but it is not necessarily the best approach in isolation. Other potential tactics such as systematically disrupting financing for pirates, addressing the lack of a global standard on the payment of ransoms, and following money trails could be useful. Such efforts also need to be joined with attempts to address the underlying causes of piracy. The lack of employment opportunities, for example, provides pirate kingpins with a consistent and ample supply of recruits. Neither can the impact of poor governance and corruption be ignored. But there is some hope in the slowly improving capacity of the Somali government. In recent weeks, Somali officials have implemented new tactics, including an anti-piracy outreach campaign and the provision of employment opportunities for youths even as the government slowly extends its reach. The real test will come at the end of next year though, when international forces are scheduled to start reducing their patrols off the coast of Somalia.

Clare Allenson is an associate in Eurasia Group's Africa practice.

Eurasia Group's weekly selection of essential reading for the political risk junkie -- presented in no particular order. As always, feel free to give us your feedback or selections by tweeting at us via @EurasiaGroup or @ianbremmer.

Must-reads

"Lebanon squanders its finest human assets"

David Gardner, Financial Times

Lebanon is losing talent ... and electricity. Last year, the country got an average of 11.4 hours of electricity per day.

"Remote Control: Our Drone Delusion"

Steve Coll, The New Yorker

Bush oversaw 48 drone strikes in Pakistan while in office. Since 2009, Obama has authorized more than 300.

"China's Drone Program Appears to Be Moving Into Overdrive"

Christopher Bodeen, Huffington Post

"If the U.S. can do it, so can we." China may trail the U.S. in drone technology, but it's narrowing the gap.

Longer reads

"The End of the Gandhis"

James Traub, Foreign Policy

The Gandhis are the paradox of Indian politics: They are both the deliverers of democracy and the nepotistic exception to the rule.

Weekly bonus

"Disruptions: Brain Computer Interfaces Inch Closer to Mainstream"

Nick Bilton, New York Times

Soon we might interact with smartphones with our minds -- because fingers are just too clumsy.

"14 Hairless Cats That Look Like Vladimir Putin"

Elizabeth F. Ralph, Foreign Policy

The headline says it all. Enjoy.

Though Boko Haram, a Nigeria-based Islamic insurgency, has generated fewer recent headlines in the Western press than have militants in nearby Mali or the country's own Niger Delta rebels, they are thought to have killed more than 1,500 people in bomb attacks and drive-by shootings over the past three years. Worryingly, the threat the group poses to Nigeria, home to an economy on track to become Africa's largest next year, may be increasing.

The northeastern state of Borno, the site of a recent Boko Haram assault that claimed more than 180 lives, represents the epicenter of Nigeria's radical Islamist threat. Parts of the majority Muslim region have effectively become a warzone. Though ideology helps fuel these movements, Boko Haram and its al Qaeda-linked offshoot Ansaru are also part of Nigeria's zero-sum regional competition for power and resources, which will continue to pit regional factions within the ruling People's Democratic Party against one another and the government against the country's newly merged opposition coalition. Hotly contested primaries next year and national elections in early 2015 will further polarize the political landscape along regional lines, creating even more fertile ground for Boko Haram and its sponsors.

Boko Haram -- which means "Western education is sacrilege" in Hausa, northern Nigeria's most widely spoken language -- has assassinated key allies of President Goodluck Jonathan's government, including both political proxies and senior clerics, most recently just days after a rare presidential visit to the region. This in turn provoked a wildly aggressive response from Nigeria's military, with enormous collateral damage to civilians. Jonathan reluctantly ordered a policy review last week that could grant amnesty to Boko Haram "moderates" willing to lay down their weapons, but the current surge in violence makes a breakthrough even less likely than before.

Northeastern states will likely remain on the front-lines of the Boko Haram threat. Proximity to porous borders with Niger and Cameroon (and on to sympathetic al Qaeda allies in Mali) provides Boko Haram with rear bases and safe havens just over the border. Though the unrest created by Boko Haram has gotten worse since the French-led intervention in Mali, its impact on Nigeria's economy has so far been contained, at least viewed from the country's economic heartland in the south. Investors generally see an attack on the southern business capital of Lagos or in the oil-rich Niger Delta as a game changer for risk perceptions. A large-scale attack in either place would probably have an immediate market impact -- on the stock exchange, currency value, and bond yields, all of which are performing strongly at the moment. For the moment, this remains a high-impact but low probability risk.

But the political and economic stakes would also rise dramatically if Boko Haram ratchets up attacks on the sectarian, ethnic, and political flashpoints in north central Nigeria, including Abuja, the country's capital, and major flashpoint cities like Jos, where sectarian and ethnic tensions are already on the rise. This is an under-appreciated risk and one that is already developing.

Boko Haram has more than once proven that it can hit Abuja. If it reorients its attention and resources to Abuja and to the ethno-sectarian tinderboxes that lie at the fault line between northern and southern Nigeria, the impacts will reverberate across the entire nation, West Africa more broadly, and the restive Sahel region to Nigeria's north.

Philippe de Pontet is head of Eurasia Group's Africa practice. Willis Sparks is director in the firm's global macro practice.

Eurasia Group's weekly selection of essential reading for the political risk junkie -- presented in no particular order. As always, feel free to give us your feedback or selections via  @EurasiaGroup or @IanBremmer.

Must-reads

"An ounce of prevention"

The Economist

Is the world adequately prepared for a global pandemic? With the first H7N9 bird flu case surfacing outside of mainland China this week, we may find out sooner than we'd like.

"Economic Development Lessons From All Corners"

Peter Blair Henry, Newsweek

Where have we seen countries flout the traditional rules of economic growth? From 1965 to 1990, South Korea ran trade deficits yet grew by 7.1 percent per year -- three times faster than the United States after World War II.

"A Rise in Wealth for the Wealthy; Declines for the Lower 93%"

Richard Fry and Paul Taylor, Pew Research

Is "7-percenters" the new buzzword? From 2009 to 2011, the upper 7 percent of households' aggregate share of total U.S. household wealth rose from 56 to 63 percent. For most Americans, the recent economic recovery hasn't been a resurgence at all.

"The deficit is falling fast. Can Washington accept victory?"

Neil Irwin, Wonkblog, The Washington Post

"Grand bargain" deficit reduction in Washington is no longer as urgent. In 2009, the budget deficit was 10 percent of GDP. Over the first three months of this year, Goldman Sachs pegs it at 4.5 percent -- and predicts it will fall below 3 percent by fiscal year 2015. 

Longer reads

"What If We Never Run Out of Oil?"

Charles C. Mann, The Atlantic

What if there is no peak oil? Is that necessarily a good thing? This essay is worth reading as much for its anecdotes, factoids, and historical perspective as for its underlying arguments. 

Eurasia Group's weekly selection of essential reading for the political risk junkie -- presented in no particular order. As always, feel free to give us your feedback or selections by tweeting at us via @EurasiaGroup or @ianbremmer.

Must-reads

"Iceland and China Enter a Free Trade Agreement"

David Jolly, New York Times

China just inked its first ever Free Trade Agreement with a European country. But with a GDP that's less than 1/500^th of China's, Iceland seems like an odd choice-what can it offer in return? The answer might lie up north.

"Alexei Navalny's Day in Court: Putin's Nemesis Faces the State's Legal Wrath"

Joshua Yaffa, Foreign Affairs

Russian blogger/activist Alexei Navalny has worked his way into the opposition's spotlight -- and the Kremlin's crosshairs. As the trial begins, the verdict is all but certain: over the past two years, the presiding judge has issued 130 convictions and no acquittals.

"After Apple, China Directs Its Ire at Microsoft"

Sterling Wong, Minyanville.com

Is China's government-sanctioned anti-Apple campaign moving on to Microsoft? This could be an early warning.

"America's problem is not political gridlock"

Lawrence Summers, Financial Times

Larry Summers asks, is political gridlock in Washington really a structural obstacle to American economic growth and improvement?

"Megacities and the Density Delusion: Why More People Doesn't Equal More Wealth"

Joel Kotkin, NewGeography.com

According to some theorists, the denser a city, the more economically productive it will be. But is this really the case? Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh, is the densest megacity (defined as a city of 10 million or more) in the world, with 115,000 people per square mile. And with a GDP per capita of $3,100, it's the poorest too.

"Maduro's pyrrhic victory"

The Economist

Why will Maduro's recent razor-thin victory in the Venezuelan presidential election prove destabilizing for the country?

Bonus...

"Two-Headed Pig Born in Chinese Village"

Sky News

After 16,000 pig corpses were pulled out of polluted Chinese rivers, we thought we'd seen it all. But China's latest pig story deserves...a double-take.